You Broke my Heart with Fanservice
by OverMaster
Summary: This time for real, we hope, the Unequally Rational and Emotional continuity's Mahora Festival. Loads and Loads of Characters. Fanservice up the walls. Unresolved Sexual Tension galore. Tons of Crack Shipping. Wish me luck, oh God, this thing is just so scary to tackle, I've been trying to figure out how to pull it off for years. Turns out I just had to add lots of swimsuits?
1. And a Cast of Thousands! In Beachwear!

Fifteen years ago, according to all History and Science books, an asteroid had crashed into Antarctica, triggering a near global cataclysm most had come to call the Second Impact (and incidentally destroying the city of Leng and all the shoggoths there, which the people in the nearby Savage Lands would have appreciated a lot if it were for the earthquakes, fires, dust storms and new mutants that popped up because of it). Many had said it had been a miracle most of mankind hadn't been wiped off the face of Earth, and while casualties were indeed high all over the globe, especially in coastal areas, the loss of human lives hadn't been majorly crippling for humanity's continued progress. In fact, many hadn't even noticed, too busy arguing about about how President Kelly would suck. Yet, several things had changed.

Weather patterns had changed, including harsher summers for the Northern and Southern hemispheres alike. The level of the seas had raised drastically, sinking several islands; and that included large chunks of Japan (technically the Philippines sunk, but given how flooded they tended to get, not one really noticed anything except how there were less poor people for a few years). For Negi Springfield, who had been born five years after the Impact, and most his students, who had been born shortly after the cataclysm, it was difficult to imagine a time where you couldn't see the sea from the tallest hill of Mahora Academy's campus, despite having read about it in the books (those who could be bothered with books, at the very least. They had tablets now, you throwback!) Negi, however, hailed from Wales, a region that still retained an overall colder climate than the remains of half-sunk Japan (distinguishable from Scotland only because they got a hair more sunlight, and all the sheep walked funny). That was why, when he had been told about certain particularities of attending the oncoming Mahora School Festival, he honestly hadn't believed them at first.

Yet, he reasoned now, it made a moderate amount of sense (for Mahora, anyway). He had no idea why the temperature had gone up so radically over the course of the last week, especially when keeping in mind they'd had a snowy Christmas a few months ago, but there was no denying a tropical summer was upon them already. Shortly after the Festival, there would be a time to think about vacations under the sun (possibly up in the mountains where it was nice and cool and there were a lot of trees to give you cover. Beaches were a winter thing), and that only further lifted the spirits of most of Negi's students, but he wasn't too sure he was that appreciative of the intense heat himself. And mostly, he couldn't fathom why Chamo, his ermine familiar, was suddenly so enamored with the present circumstances, since his whole body was covered in fairly thick white fur.

"Won't you be cooking alive, walking around like that?" the red haired boy had once asked his faithful, chain smoking partner. "Maybe you should stay indoors with the air conditioner up until—"

"Nonsense, Bro, nonsense!" Chamo had laughed it off, smiling as he gazed, distracted, towards where Hakase Satomi, lost in thoughts, held two different sets of swimwear in her small hands, comparing them to each other. "No way am I going to miss having all that fun with you, heh heh heh heh…"

Negi frowned, looked towards Satomi as well, then back at the ermine fairy, and sighed. "Honestly, Chamo. Sometimes I almost think Anya was right about you…"

* * *

 _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ and _UQ Holder_ are creations and intellectual property of Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha.

 _Aa! Megamisama!_ is the creation and intellectual property of Fujishima Kosuke and Kodansha.

 _Fate/Stay Night_ is the creation and intellectual property of Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon.

 _To Love Ru_ is the creation and intellectual property of Yabuki Kentaro, Hasemi Saki and Shueisha.

 _Lobo_ is the creation of Keith Giffen and Roger Slifer, and intellectual property of DC Comics. Because you know, mainstream American system.

Thanks to Shadow Crystal Mage for the proofreading and editing.

Special thanks to Darkenning for inspiring the segments with the UQ Holder segment and providing the blueprints for it.

* * *

 **You Broke My Heart with Fanservice.**

* * *

 **Chapter One: ... and a Cast of Thousands! In Beachwear! AND A MILLION ELEPHANTS!**

* * *

"Hot..." muttered the short, black haired young man, as he uneasily stirred from one side of his bed to the other. He was shirtless and reduced to his boxers, despite his usual preference to sleep with some sort of shirt on, and yet he still felt too hot for comfort.

Back at Nekomi Tech, months ago, they'd had good air conditioners in the rooms of the Motor Club. Tamiya, Ootaki and Chihiro would pick them up from the junkyard, but working together, they could have them working at top conditions in little time. Which was quite a feet, since this was a _Japanese_ junkyard they were talking about, and if it was there, it was only after being used as battle armor in a Mad Max movie. Ever since Morisato Keiichi had to leave for Mahora however, he'd found he wasn't that good at fixing air conditioners from junkyards on his own. He'd once mentioned it to Skuld, and to her credit she quickly worked on it, but the air conditioner she came up with was so powerful it nearly had frozen him to death over the course of a single night. That was too much, even for someone born and raised in Hokkaido, still Japan's coldest surviving area.

Keiichi could probably have had the kind of air conditioner he wanted had he asked for Emiya Shirou's help, but he wasn't that familiar with the younger man yet, despite having shared some time together in the general vicinity of Ala Alba already. Besides, he was aware Emiya was currently wrapped in Very Serious Matters that were literally of life and death, and he didn't wish to bother him any more than strictly necessary (since he knew how these things ended up, and one time going up against a gigantic vampire moon rabbit kaiju was enough for his lifetime, thank you very much). So he'd been spending the last few nights trying to sleep through the dry heat wave currently cooking the campus slow but steadily, ever growing as the full bloom of summer approached.

It wasn't easy. It actually was kind of a relief for Keiichi when his alarm clock rang, and he had to come out of his futon and his bedroom. He took the coldest bath he could and, feeling better already, put on a light undershirt and shorts. He began fixing a precooked meal and then took a moment to turn the TV on, intending to watch some of the news before heading for the Festival. He did it so mechanically he didn't even notice the suggestive nature of what he had just tuned into until he heard the loud, sensuous music blaring, after he'd already turned his back on the television to prepare his small bachelor table.

Keiichi tensed up when a low, feminine purr reached his ears from behind, sending small shivers up his spine immediately. He was a boy already past his teen years, even if barely so, and it was no wonder he would instantly recognize the kind of sound that normally only could come from a porn movie or his sister's room. But he hadn't contracted one of those channels, and he was pretty sure he hadn't left any movies in the DVD player last night, so what...?

Spinning around, Keiichi's brown eyes popped out as he saw two long, lean, tanned legs peeking from between the deep slits of a dark blue dress, swinging up playfully along with the provocative music. Like a good dog being told to sit, he dropped on his butt before the screen, leaning ahead in full attention, the breakfast and the Festival already well forgotten. His hands firmly gripped on his knees, since it wasn't time yet to start gripping something else.

The sensual, feminine voice from before purred huskily again, as the camera panned all over the exotic, buxom body in the blue dress, lingering on each well rounded curve in each and every right place. "Oh, very well..." the woman said. "But, just a little bit, fine...?"

Keiichi gasped loudly, quickly reaching for the box of paper tissues he would keep by the TV. For nosebleeds and spilled drinks, of course. Really.

The camera was now zooming in calculated circles around the mystery woman's large bust, well framed by her wide cleavage, a golden necklace hanging above it. Then it went up enough as to show the brown skinned female's chin and mouth, as she teasingly tossed some of her long, way silver hair around, with the flair of an experienced seductress. "Ah..." she breathed out. "It's really hot in here..."

"Y-Yes, you are!" Keiichi gulped, his thick black eyebrows twitching as he started to unzip.

Giggling but in a mature, sexual way, the woman sat up on the silky pink sheets she had been resting on, and extended a bare foot forward, so its sole took the focus of the screen. Morisato salivated slightly, leaning even closer, until... the foot came out through the screen and her toes gently patted on his nose.

"..." Keiichi said. It's worth remembering by this point this ordinary Japanese student had already met a goddess, several demons, a wolf boy, Batman, King Arthur as a woman (at least Negi-sensei insisted she was King Arthur, even if Keiichi still had a hard time believing him) Classes 3-A and 3-F, and weirdoes claiming to be from another universe. He took a foot coming out of his TV to touch it far better than any of us would have, even if part of his lack of reaction also came from sheer befuddled shock rather than adaptation to the strange. He sighed and zipped back up, realizing it was going to be one of those days.

After a few soft taps, the foot seemed to grow upset it was getting no real reaction from the boy, save perhaps a small tentative lick at the heel, so the next thing it did was strongly kick Keiichi across the face, sending him stumbling back against the floor. "Hey!" he cried, quickly turning back around and swinging his Pactio card out...

... Only to start gawking again as a major flash came from the screen, heralding the emergence of the sexy, sexy woman from the set, her hands holding on the edges of the screen as she pulled herself out. "Oh my Goddess," Keiichi swallowed, backing away, intimidated.

The woman looked at him, centering her cold, green eyes on his sweaty, terrified face. Her lips, full and coated in a soft layer of hot pink gloss opened, and again she spoke...

"Good morning!" she waved cheerfully, laughing in a way she had picked up from her Uncle Grandpa. While Keiichi gasped even further, she dusted off the shoulders of the long cape secured around her dress, and then quickly skipped forward to strongly pat Keiichi's shoulders in a way that reminded him too much of Tamiya for comfort. "So you're Keiichi, huh?! Good, good! Not too big, not that much taller than her, but not a circus midget like that nerdy kid either. But why were you wasting your time watching porn? You should be going to pick her up already! Dumbass!" she laughed again, punching him on a shoulder a little bit too hard and making him wince. "You've got wonderful Festival memories to make together starting as soon as you can!"

"Who, who are you?!" Keiichi asked.

She grabbed his chin with a hand, pushing it up to close his mouth. And she kept on talking. "Maybe taking her to the World Tree the first night is going too fast, but then, the third night is always too crowded and all the bushes will be taken... so what about the second night, huh? That sounds just right, doesn't it? Yeah, I knew you'd agree, what a smart boy you are..."

"Who are you?!" Keiichi repeated, struggling to open his mouth again.

"Now, she can be very headstrong, but trust me, deep inside she's as much of a romantic as any of us," the strange woman kept on talking a friendly, terrifying storm. "When she says 'No' while pulling a chainsaw on you, she just means 'Yes, but please go a bit slower'. Then you go a bit slower, but not too much, what is this, some wimpy manga where it takes the couple twenty six years to seal the deal? That's too much even for a goddess, we aren't all as patient as Belld-"

"Please, who are you?!" Keiichi all but begged now, slamming his hands together, more in prayer than menace.

"Oh," the temptress paused. "That's right. I haven't told you who I am."

"No, you haven't!" he said.

"Not any longer," she smiled smugly, stepping back while tossing her hair around again, striking a proud sexy pose. It looked like she did everything sexily. She probably even solved crosswords puzzles sexily. "I am the Goddess of Love! Urd, Skuld's big sister!"

* * *

"Oh, for the Ancients' sake," Nana Astar Deviluke muttered as she woke up all alone in her bed that fateful morning, looking aside to find the sheets on Momo's side all missing, not to mention Momo herself.

Already in a foul mood, the short, pink haired Princess of the Deviluke Empire got up from the bed, put on her underwear, a loose shirt and pants, stomped her way out of the bedroom, and made her way directly to Yuuki Rito's room down the hallway. Without bothering to knock, she kicked the door open. "Momo!" she shouted. "How many times do I have to tell you stop to doing that, dammit?!-?!"

Startled by the sudden yell, the orange haired high schooler in betweenthe naked and peacefully sleeping Lala Satalin and Momo Belia Deviluke sprang up with a cry of his own, eyes bugging out at the sight of the fuming, scowling Nana at his doorstep. "EEE-YAAAA! N-N-NANA-SAMA!"

"Good morning to you too, Pervert!" Nana hissed, taking a mental note, at the very least, he was wearing his full pajamas yet, not to mention he didn't have any body parts hanging out of them. That was why she had spared his life that morning. "Momo!" she shouted next. "I know you can hear me, so don't ignore me!"

Her shorter haired, cattily smirking twin opened her large, round but sharper around the edges eyes and asked in a tiny purr, long black tail lazily swirling around Rito, "Why do you get angry at me but not at Lala?"

"Because she's the fiancée, you're just a homewrecker! On more than one front!" Nana shrieked, unwilling to call her a cheater in front of the gasping, blushing Rito, who was currently trying to block his eyes with a hand while the other threw blankets on the still well asleep Lala. "Don't you have any shame, that's our sister's married life you're messing with!"

"W-We aren't married yet!" Rito protested while Lala finally stirred up, frowning as she sat up, with a blanket on her head and others slipping down her magnificent body.

"Why am I covered in blankets?" the eldest of the three Princesses asked, smacking her lips together in a sleepy fashion. "The weather's too warm, Ritooooooo… Oh, good morning, Nana. Came to join in? There's still room for one!"

Nana took her head back and screamed in anger. "WAAAUUUGHHHHHH!"

"Oh, don't be like that, I know you like sleeping clinging to Momo anyway!" Lala replied. "Besides, we can buy Rito a bigger bed if that bothers you so much…!"

Serving the plates of breakfast at the table of the floor below, the pineapple-haired Yuuki Mikan, wearing a light orange summer dress and sandals, sighed in mild exasperation. "I'm starting to consider becoming a follower of Lex Luthor," she shared to her red-haired cousin Nao, who sat indolently already nibbling on her meal.

Nao only shrugged in apathy. "Whatever floats your boat. What difference does it make, we're Japanese anyway. If they kill Rito, can I have his breakfast?"

"No. Show some respect," Mikan chided the older girl.

"His Playstation?"

"Nao, please."

"His bed?"

"I thought you hated the musky alien smells all over it?"

"I don't know, it's kind of growing on me."

* * *

"It's not that different from attending a large convention," the black-haired, bespectacled and rather curvy Fujiyoshi Harumi, one of the few relatively sane students of High School Class 3-F, explained as the three of them marched through the merry crowd strolling in all directions along the streets of Mahora campus. She wore a lime green bikini top along with Daisy Dukes that had the upper button open, allowing the top of the matching bikini bottoms to peek out.

"What are you talking about?" asked Inugami Kotaro, in sandals, an open light jacket, and wide, loose swimming trunks. As always when he was in sight of his new roommates, kept had his wolf ears and tail hidden. "I've been in conventions before and they never were like this!"

That was true, too, even though the conventions he knew used to be those the Yakuza and traffickers held, where he would often break in to take a contract target or another down. Those were great fun too, in their own way.

Kobushi Abiru, walking by his other side in a red bikini that covered far less than the amount of bandages all over her limbs, stomach area and hips, elaborated patiently. "She means manga conventions, Kotaro-kun. There, many will attend in costumes, you know, cosplay. This is pretty much the same as that, but well, with a vacation motif, since the summer break's just around the corner..."

"And because it makes more money that way, of course!" Harumi, let us remember, who was stable only by 3-F standards, grinned wickedly as she made a quick sign of counting invisible yen bills with her hands. Then she pointed towards the nearest stands selling memorabilia and souvenirs, of which there was no scarcity anywhere in sight. They almost always were heavily surrounded by eager buyers and customers, often standing in line under the bright sun, much to Kotaro's growing surprise. "See that? It'll get even worse, or better, depending on your viewpoint, when everyone's out of their beds already. You can make a fortune if you know what to sell in the Festival and have the looks for it!"

"Which is why Harumi-chan has such high hopes for her doujin circle's sales this afternoon," Abiru quietly added for the boy's benefit.

Harumi rubbed her hands like a certain stereotypical, racially offensive Internet meme image. You know which one. "Damn straight! A pity we can't sell the more explicit ones, though, but we'll make a killing regardless!"

Kotaro flinched as his sensitive ears caught on the whistling of a few drones zooming high above them, leaving behind a trail of confetti rain everywhere, adding to the Carnival feeling of the festivities. "Just like Rio De Janeiro," he mused aloud, remembering a few documentaries he'd watched with his mother before she thought they featured too much scandalous samba dancing and flipped the channels.

"Well, not quite, but we're getting there," Harumi smiled. "I doubt Rio has fighting tournaments, though, so you'll no doubt feel more at ease here, Kota-kun!"

"Oh, they have, it's just they're illegal and underground," Kotaro casually commented, swinging his arms behind his neck indolently. "That's what I heard, at least." From a capoeira nut he'd once beaten black and blue, naturally.

Abiru looked at him ponderingly with her eye that wasn't covered in bandages. "You seem to know a whole lot about illicit activities, Kotaro-kun. I'm not sure that's good for a boy your age."

"I like violent TV, that's all," Kotaro pretended innocence. "Cop shows and that stuff."

Then his nose twitched. _Ah, finally_ , he thought, smiling to himself as they came across, at a crossroads and under a gigantic banner leading the way towards the theme houses and cafes, Negi Springfield and his usual immediate entourage of Chamo the ermine, Hasegawa Chisame, Hakase Satomi and Tsunetsuki Matoi.

Harumi was the first to give a greeting as both groups came to a halt. "Oh hey, good morning, Matoi-chan, everyone! Looking fine today! As expected from Sensei, being an early bird!"

"Girls," the short haired Matoi nodded sedately towards her two classmates. She wasn't wearing a swimsuit, but an ensemble of loose red shirt, summer shorts, sandals and a small floppy hat that made her look vaguely like an admittedly far cuter version of Gilligan. "Nice to see you, too."

"Yo, Negi!" Kotaro quickly made his way to his rival, who was shirtless but otherwise wearing swimming trunks and sandals as well, in matching dark blue tones. Negi smiled at him and the boys lightly bumped fists, the festive air apparently cooling off their habitual mutual tension. "Slept well last night, I assume? You'd better be in top shape for the fights, Glasses!"

"I assure you I'll be both giving all my best and *at* my absolute best, Kotaro-kun," the boy teacher promised, with more of an edge than he'd show almost anyone else. "You?"

"Okay, I can see where this is going, don't start it already, you two," warned Chisame, in a purple one piece with a sarong tied around her waist. "You can wait until tonight before giving each other more brain damage, can't you?"

"As snippy as ever, I see," Kotaro gave her a sullen look, which in turn made Negi frown disapprovingly at him. Since Harumi wasn't in the mood for a scene in public at the time, she forced a laugh and brought her hands together. She wished she could be as good at that as Haruna was.

"Well, it's a lucky coincidence we find you right now, Sensei!" she said. "You were going to that haunted house your club was working on, weren't you?"

Satomi, in a modest light blue tube top and fairly long shorts, nodded, gaining more interest than she'd shown ever since they had run into the others. "Oh, yes! Were you coming as well? I highly recommend you experience it firsthand before you submit yourselves to anything else in the Festival! I have worked on several incredibly lifelike and impressive contraptions to enhance the pulse pounding experience alongside Skuld and Lala-san!"

At that, Harumi and Abiru's faces went very pale and their mouths hung open. Negi, Chamo, Chisame and Matoi all sweatdropped, sharing a thought that they couldn't really fault them over their reaction.

"A-A-Actually, now that I think about it..." Fujiyoshi rasped uneasily, "I had an early commitment to my doujin circle, Paru must be there too..."

"Haruna-san told us that'd be later, that she would be working on the first shift at our attraction," Satomi pointed out.

"Um..." Abiru began, "I, I have premium tickets for the Great Tails of the World expo, and I wanted to cash on them early..."

"Nonsense, there'll be time for that later!" Kotaro said. "I wanna see what kinda goofy things Negi's girls have cooked up!"

"Goofy?" Hakase scowled. "That's namist!"

Abiru blinked. "Wait, how is that namist?"

Hakase blinked. "I don't know, it just felt namist, calling something 'goofy'"

 _Somewhere in OverMaster's backlog, Keys of The Kingdom sneezed._

Kotaro laughed. "I don't get scared by anything! Let's see what do you have to throw at me, Onee-chan! Try your worst, I'm waiting for it!"

"... you poor fool," Negi very quietly, very weakly said.

Kotaro huffed his way. "What was that, now?"

"Nothiiiiing."

* * *

"Skuld's sister?" Keiichi repeated, dubiously.

Urd frowned. "Do you have any reason to doubt that, after I came through a television screen?"

"N-No, it's just... well, she only mentioned having one sister, and her name was Belldandy! Hard to miss, she's a hardcore, kinda creepy siscon about it."

"I see," Urd said, taking the news very well all things considered. "So she never told you about me."

"No, Ma'am."

"Well," she folded her arms, "at least I'd hope she'd talk about Bell in a regular basis."

"Constantly!" he nodded, only to realize then he probably had just insulted her further. "Hardcore siscon stuff."

She didn't act surprised at all, however, choosing to just sigh while cocking her head to the side, eyes half-closed. "Figures. She's never given me the respect I deserve. Here I am, trying to improve her non-existent love life, seeing if I can get her to finally move on, despite the fact that'd only get me into deeper trouble, and what do I get? Any recognition at least? Nope! When will she grow up, honestly..."

"I, I sympathize," Keiichi gulped. "Sometimes my little sister acts as if I embarassed her, too..."

"Well, family's still family, Keiichi," the woman told him. Then she grinned again, shaking him by a shoulder. "And now you're family too, I'd still do this for you, even if not for her! Here, have some tickets!" she said, stuffing his hands with all sorts of colorful little pieces of paper. "Tickets for every attraction in the Festival! First row seats for the Tournament! The dudes will bleed and even sweat on your very faces! You won't even have to stand in lines thanks to your Nee-san! And this one! This one's important!" she chuckled maniacally, holding a large golden ticket up. "It's for the Science Fair, the quickest way to that brat's heart! You only have to nod and gasp at everything she says, and gawk at anything she describes and shows you, and you'll be set, boy!"

"Um, thank you, Ma'am, but... what, what ever gave you the impression Sku-chan was interested in me? She's always pissed off at me, and I'm always trying her patience, and, well, she's obviously a siscon-"

"Cheez, kid, it's as if you didn't spend any time around Negi!" Urd protested, forcing him to accept the golden ticket for two as well. "What, you in denial because you're afraid of being branded a Lolicon? Ship's sailed, buddy. Besides, this is Japan! And it's better than being branded a permavirgin!"

(The Opinions Held by Urd in No Way Reflect That of This Fanfic's Management. Urd is a Profesional Half-Devil Ancient Entity Beyond Human Concepts of Good And Evil. This Fanfiction's Authors Do Not Encourage You to Try and Pick Up Lolis Over the Alternative of Permavirginity. All Local Laws Apply. Thank You, Now We Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Fanfic.)

Urd and Keiichi waited for the disclaimer to be over before retaking the scene. "What, what does Negi-sensei have to do with any of this? And how do you know about him and his ties to Tsundere anyway? How much have you been spying on us?"

"How rude, it's not spying or stalking if you do it out of Pure Love," Urd piously replied, graciously shrugging her shoulders. "Just trust Nee-san's infinite wisdom, work hard on the first day to get her impressed with your plucky resolve, and tomorrow night, not too early and not too late, you take her under that tree, confess to her, plant a big wet one on that little soft mouth under the stars, and do it in the bushes like incestous loli twins! It's a perfect plan, there's no way it possibly could go wrong!"

"By saying that, you've just guaranteed it'll go wrong!"

"That happens when it's a human saying it! I'm a goddess! My word is an edict of nature!" Urd cackled, hands on her hips. "Never fear, I'll be hanging around at all times. Whenever you need advice, Urd will be there. Now go make yourself presentable, Skuld should be here-"

The door's bell rang.

Urd smirked, waving as she began phasing down and out of sight through the floor. "- Right now, see? Well, best of luck, loverboy! But remember, not a word of this to Skuld or you'll regret it! What happens between a man and a sexy woman indoors stays indoors (or under a bush, for that matter), or else!"

"But, but, Nee-san! I mean, Ma'am!" the young man cried. "You can't just drop this on me, I'm not even sure I-"

But she was already gone, and Keiichi only could sigh, as there was no sign she ever had been there at all. Even the TV was only showing the usual news again ('Famine! War! Economy Crisis! Kim Kardashian! A hippo makes it into a viral video! Great tragedy as two dogs die in earthquake!')

The bell rang again. "Coming, coming!" Morisato sighed, heading for the door. He was sure of one thing at least, he wouldn't tell Skuld about this Urd person just yet. He knew well how volatile Skuld could get, especially when asked about her background. And it looked like there was some bad blood going on between them. Last thing he wanted was to turn that fuse on...

"Well, finally!" Skuld said as he opened the door, pouting in an ensemble of white and blue stripped one piece, sandals, and a white brimmed summer hat, with a large bag hanging from her shoulder. Next to her stood a grinning and waving Akashi Yuuna, her roommate and 3-A classmate, in a black bikini Keiichi found very uncomfortable to be around, and white sports sneakers. She was growing up quickly, it seemed, and filling out accordingly. He only hoped they wouldn't run into her Dad while he was around, at least. He was too young and virginal to die. "And why haven't you dressed up yet? I've got a very busy schedule today, you idiot!"

"Ah, sorry, I was watching the news and lost track of the time," the college student apologized as he ushered them in. He had to wonder how they'd made it into the male dorm just like that, but then 3-A had ways men weren't meant to know. "Please sit down and have some juice while I get ready, and, um... Skuld?"

"Yeah?" the young Norn said.

Keiichi sheepishly held the golden ticket up. "It turns out, I had this ticket for the Science Expo on me. It's good for two, and I was wondering-"

Without flinching, Skuld quickly pulled a bigger golden ticket out of her bag. "Oh, yeah, that's right, I forgot to tell you. I had a Premium one good for four already, since I'm part of the Committee after all. I was thinking of going with you, Yuuna and Makie, since someone needs to get some culture into your heads for once..."

"Oh joy," Yuuna rolled her eyes while Keiichi blanked. Then something caught her attention. "Sempai? What are those paper towels doing by the TV?"

"I, I had spilled some juice while watching TV!"

"Oh, yeah, I don't doubt you did..."

* * *

When Negi, Kotaro, his lovely companions and that weasel arrived at the rebuilt Aisaka Manor, now made to resemble an ancient, spooky castle with threatening, blood curling banners proudly hanging over each door and window (Haruna had a real flair for disturbing, unsettling mottos and slogans, and to no one's surprise, so did Tsunetsuki), they saw a long line of visitors already standing before the front door, several of them chattering amongst themselves. Many a boyfriend were holding an umbrella to prevent skin cancer.

From what Kotaro could overhear, many of them discussed the wisdom of trusting their lives and safety to something built by 3-A students, including two members of the local Mad Science Council. But the overall consensus seemed to be it'd be a golden opportunity to sue the Yukihiro and Suzushiro estates (naively, most students ignored the lengths the lawyers of both families were willing to reach in the line of duty, not to mention not bothering to read the Evilly Used License Agreement that stated they had already voided their right to do so by standing in line) so nobody was leaving yet, despite how slowly the line was moving. As was usual in this situation, at least three enterprising students where nearby selling cold drinks, ice-cream and offering alternate swimsuits.

Behind a desk at the entrance sat Misora and Cocone, both sweating under the meager protection of a portable electric fan, in nun habits stained with large spots of false blood and stamping on the tickets of the visitors before ushering them in. Misora had a deadly bored expression on her face as she worked that made her twin to her partner's usual expression, at least until Cocone tugged on her sleeve. "Hmmm? What is it, Coco- Oh!" the young nun grinned, her face brightening as she saw Negi. "Sensei, Sensei, c'mere!" she quickly beckoned him and the others over. "Nice to see you this early, guys! C'mon, skip the line, you get a pass!"

"Hey, that's not fair!" protested the long-haired, curvaceous Kotegawa Yui, in a pure white bikini top, long sarong skirt, and sandals. She was standing at one of the first spots of the line, ticket already in hand, her other hand holding her phone with its 'Beast Tracker' app to warn her if Rito came close. "Playing favorites that way, that's so improper!"

Misora hushed her angrily. "What are you saying, Sempai, he's our club adviser and they're our clubmates, it's perfectly okay for them to be here! Don't pay her any attention, Sensei..."

"Yes? And what is their excuse, then?" Kotegawa pointed at the impassive Kotaro, Abiru and Harumi while Negi flinched uneasily.

"I'm a wolfman," Kotaro said blandly.

Harumi blinked. "Seriously? Are you going to play a role here after all, Kotaro-kun?"

"Yeah, I'm the scariest, baddest wolfman around, these guys are just lucky they didn't get in during my turn or I'd scare the Speedos outta them for the whole summer," Kotaro boasted, waving a hand around with the flippant air of someone used to bullshitting his way through life. "And this is a mummy, see?" he grinned, poking a thumb towards Abiru, who simply frowned slightly and lightly slapped the back of his head. Then she not so lightly slapped the guy currently sneaking behind her to take pics of her ass with his cellphone.

Kotegawa blinked. "Well, I had no idea... Carry on then, I suppose..."

"Consider it done," Misora said before smiling again at Negi, intertwining her hands. "The Unholy Sisters of the Bloody Convent welcome you to the den of nightmares, brave Negi-kun! We are the restless spirits of two young maidens murdered two centuries ago on these grounds, now bound to perform hellish tasks like slaves of darkness here, until Haruka-sempai's turn starts! Please keep those horrors in mind, as you navigate through the maze of terrors waiting for you inside!"

"... boo..." Cocone added, in a very quiet and non-scary tone.

"Thank you, Misora-san, Cocone-chan," Negi smiled, nodding along while walking in, Chisame sighing and following him. "We'll be praying for your souls' rest while we also pray for our lives."

"That'd be awfully nice of you, Negi-kun, see you!" Misora laughed coquettishly, blushing slightly before dropping her cutesy act and staring in a soulless, dry way at the people in the line as soon as the young visitors had disappeared inside. "By the way, any of you girls get ideas about hitting on him during the Festival and you'll learn firsthand this house is big enough to hide a corpse in there for years. No joke."

They _had_ found a _truly_ disturbing number of corpses in the house as they'd cleaned. The only reason the place wasn't a crime scene was because a lot of them had to fang-like bite holes that Evangeline swore weren't hers, are you trying to insinuate she had a big mouth?

"That'd be the judgment of God, of course, not ours," Cocone added softly, with a small nod.

"How about hitting on you, then?" teasingly smirked the guy with the cellphone.

Misora, once again, spoke in a terrifyingly matter of fact way. "Oh, then burying the body wouldn't be necessary, since there wouldn't be enough of it left..."

"I think I like you a bit better already," Yui had to admit.

* * *

"Oh, hey, guys," Murakami Natsumi blinked, turning her head at the sound of Yuuna's voice. It was an unexpected sight, that of Yuuna, Skuld-san and Morisato-sempai coming to greet her backstage during the preparations for her afternoon play. Since Natsumi was working at the time she simply sported a functional ensemble of light shoes, a plain shirt and shorts, which were as non-flashy and effectively simple as Natsumi herself. "Nice to see you, but what are you doing here so early?"

"Well," Yuuna said, smirking and folding her arms under her chest, while several students, male and female, working at the sidelines briefly stopped to eye the slight resulting bounce, "why not? We're friends after all, right? And you even gave us all free tickets, so the least we could do was showing interest on your work, see if we could help you with anything..."

For a moment, Natsumi couldn't help but looking at her, this fairly popular, very well developing, athletic daughter of a respected teacher telling her that, as if Yuuna had something green and six legged stuck on her face. Then she mentally chided herself, thinking that even if they were there only because the stage was closer to Morisato-sempai's dormitory than any other attraction any other 3-A members were working at, it was still a nice touch she should treat accordingly.

Natsumi had nailed it, by the way.

She smiled at the strange trio. "Nah, thanks, we've got everything covered here. See, it's finished already," she added, gesturing towards the set where the first act of the play would take place, "and right now we're only doing last minute touches. In this business, it's important to have everything prepared at least a couple of days before beginning, since either way, something or another is bound to pop up at the last second..."

"I thought actors weren't supposed to say that kind of things before a premiere?" Skuld asked, cocking an eyebrow.

Natsumi shrugged with a faint smile. "It can't be helped, that's the way it is. I think it makes theater all the more exciting actually, so I'm kinda okay with it. Improvising on the fly can be a welcome extra challenge... but don't take it so seriously anyway, mostly I mean little bits and details that have to be changed along the way. That's all, usually."

"Well, if everything's going so fine, why don't you take a couple hours off 'til then and come with us?" Yuuna took pity on her. "C'mon, it's not fair you'd spend all morning here while the rest of us stroll around and play. Seriously, shouldn't Chizuru be telling you this right now? Where is she, by the way?"

"Um, Chizu-nee went to greet her father, I think she's showing him around the Festival as we speak," Natsumi replied. "And yours is...?" she asked, only to then immediately regret it. She knew her father was always a very... sensitive topic for Yuuna, but then again she just didn't know what else to talk about with her. Natsumi didn't understand anything about basketball, after all.

Much to her relief, Yuuna only took it with a casual shrug. "You know, being a teacher, he's saddled with crowd control. Why do you think I chose to go out with the girls?" she cockily grinned, tugging on the strings of her bikini top while Keiichi made a point of looking aside innocently and Skuld pouted. "His usual spot is in the surveillance rooms, so it's not like he'll be around in the streets to throw blankets on me..."

"God help you if he gets footage of you walking around like that, though," Natsumi felt like fairly warning her, twirling around the pencil she had been using to take notes on the last few pieces of pre-production minutiae.

"Oh, He won't," Skuld had to snicker. "God, I mean, not _her_ dad."

Yuuna gave her roommate a brief annoyed glance before smiling at Natsumi again, patting her on a shoulder. "Don't worry about that, I know I'm not going to! So whaddya say, huh? Aren't you coming to check the Haunted House? Negi-kun must be there right now, yanno!"

Natsumi had the briefest blushing spell. "Um, but... m-maybe I should wait for Chizu-nee to come back first, after all, she'll want to go see Iinchou as well, and-"

"Just go already, Director!" one of the young stagehands told her. "We've got everything covered here!"

"Yeah, trust us, Director!" another of the boys said. "We'll be rooting for you, but whoever snoozes, loses!"

"R-R-Rooting for me at what, I, I only need to keep my mind at this place, guys!" the freckled girl stuttered, while Keiichi, Yuuna and Skuld shared discreet eyerolls. Then Murakami sighed, her tone softening. "But thank you anyway, if it really means so much for you, I can't possibly turn you off..."

"That's the spirit, Director!" one of the girls working there pumped her fist up at her. "Show those hussies the raw capacity of a Theater Woman!"

"M-Mariko-chan, pleeeaase!" Natsumi clenched her teeth, her tone suddenly more strained than ever.

"For what it counts," Morisato kindly told the small actress, "I think you'd be better for Negi-sensei than Yukihiro-san, or Suzushiro-san, or even Ch-"

"Just wait here while I go put on something more comfortable, right, Sempai?!" Natsumi told him in an _even more_ strained, and quite icy, tone as she quickly slipped away before he could finish the sentence.

About five minutes later, some monster calling itself 'The Demon of The Play' proceeded to try and scare away all the other members of the Theater Club.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Greetings, hapless mortals, lost wanderers, to the House of Nightmares!" Shiina Sakurako said as she stepped from the darkness of the living room, walking up to greet Negi, Kotaro, the girls, and you know, that guy. She wore the skintight costume of a black cat, complete with whiskers painted on her cheeks, and giggled while waving her fake paws towards them. "I'm Lady Bad Luck, and now you'll dread the moment you crossed my path! Nyaa!"

Satomi blinked, smiled, and then stepped ahead, fondly patting Sakurako's head. "Good kitten. Good kitten!"

Apparently, Chachamaru came by it honestly, which would bring up all sort of 'Nature Versus Nurture' questions if she weren't robotic, and as it was just raised even more questions.

"Myyyyaaaa," Sakurako purred in delight, closing her eyes and somehow managing to wag the long fail tail attached to her butt. Then she raised her chin, offering her throat to Hakase, who quickly went to scratch it, up and down, causing Sakurako's hips to wiggle...

"Um," Chisame said. "Are we running a haunted house or a petting zoo here?"

Ignoring her altogether, Satomi began rubbing Sakurako's back as the cheerleader dropped on all fours before her, purring even louder in an almost orgasmic fashion.

"No, seriously," Chisame said, "the people back there will want a tour too, I don't think we should be-"

"HISSSSS!" Sakurako bared her teeth at her, eyes actually managing to flash in the dim lighting of the room. A startled Chisame backed away behind the protective Matoi, while Kotaro's face twitched, long repressed feline-chasing instincts struggling to break through his human nature.

Negi frowned, took two steps forward, and lightly bopped Sakurako's nose with two fingers. "No, Kitty, no! Stop that!"

Sakurako immediately sprang back to her feet, blushing. "Ah, sorry about that, Sensei! I guess I lost myself in the role for some reason!"

Harumi whistled. "Wow, Sensei! You used to be more of a pushover to your class than this!"

The boy mage sighed. "Yeah, well, Saber-san recently took me aside and warned me if I didn't start putting my foot down, soon they'd be gagging me and tying me to poles to offer me as a prize for beauty contests, or even forcing personal info out of me by sticking-"

"That's what I tell you all the time, but it took _her_ warning you for you to get the idea?!" Chisame protested.

"Chisame, please, no scary violent scenes in this hideous manor of graphic horror and lawless massacre," Sakurako said, spinning around on her heels and gesturing for them to follow her deeper into the house. "Now if you'll just come with me, I'll show you the first room of our intense gallery of- NYAAAAAA!"

Satomi, frowning, slapped away the hand of Abiru that had just tugged on Sakurako's tail.

"I'm sorry," Abiru quickly offered. "Normally I don't go after artificial ones, but this one has a strange allure to it..."

"I'll be watching you, missy!" Hakase warned the heavily bandaged girl as Sakurako rubbed her butt, wincing while adjusting her tail.

Sakurako groaned, rubbing her rear. "I really don't like it when people treat my poor tail so roughly, nyaaaaa..."

"But, but how does that even- Oh, freaking forget it!" Chisame said. The most obvious answer was one she didn't want to say out loud

"There are things not meant to known by highly rational minds like yours, Chisame-sama," Matoi offered with a sympathetic pat of shoulders. "But if you really want to learn-"

"I'm not putting on a cat costume for you!"

"Then, should I put on a cat costume for Chisame-sama instead?"

"Only if I get to take you to the vet for a sterilization right after!"

"Deal!"

"PUT YOUR CLOTHES BACK ON, TSUNETSUKI!"

* * *

"So, Oniichan!" Illyasviel called out with a wide, wicked grin on her face and her arms defiantly folded. "You certainly are flirting with death today, aren't you?!"

Emiya Shirou flinched, pausing as only a man who doesn't want to turn around can,before turning around with a sigh to face the very same little girl who had sicced a murderous Hercules on him a few nights ago and who for some reason always sent Kakizaki-san into a panic attack. She stood at a corner of the crowded campus streets, smugly smirking at them, in sandals and a purple bikini that perhaps was a tad too daring for someone her apparent age, while behind them stood a dark haired woman who smiled pleasantly in a simple lime green summer dress and shoes, with a yellow band in her hair and several bags overstuffed with pricey souvenirs hanging from a pole over her shoulder, like some kind of sexy, rich hobo.

"Illya-chan, good morning," the red haired young man in blue shorts and an open tropical shirt sighed, doing his best to smile at the little terror. By his side, Saber, in a simple white bikini, stood barefoot and scowling, with a plastic watergun in her hand. Behind them, Fujimura Taiga blinked, sipping from a can of soda and wearing a sleeveless tiger print shirt, Bermuda shorts and sneakers. "Ah, Fuji-nee, this is Illyasviel von Einzbern-chan..."

"Oh!" Taiga perked up, easily flash stepping between Shirou and his Servant, much to Saber's confusion. Facing Illya directly, she bluntly asked her, "You're Saber's little sister or niece, aren't you? How cute...!"

Illya blinked. "Saber's relative?!"

"Well, of course, she's Saber von Einzbern, after all!" the woman said, gesturing with her shoulders towards the blonde while Shirou facepalmed and prepared for the worst. "She never told me there were other relatives of Kiritsugu's wife here in Mahora, though!"

Illya, after a moment of puzzlement, deduced the basics of it and smiled deviously again. "Oh, I see, how silly of me...! Fu fu fu, yes, of course Saber came to be part of the family, although you could say she was adopted...!"

"That much is true," Saber humbly admitted. "Irisviel was extremely kind."

For a moment, she and Illya shared a look that said that for all they currently loathed each other as enemies to a depth so great they were on the outskirts of hell and about to emigrate in, they could both agree that Irisviel von Einzbern was too good for this sinful Earth.

"... oh," Taiga said, taking a moment to look back and forth between them. "I thought I had noticed you two didn't look too alike, yeah. Anyway, family is something you carry in your heart, not your genes! I'm Fujimura Taiga, Shirou's homeroom teacher and legal guardian, nice to meetcha! And the lady with you would be...?"

Said lady bowed very politely, none of the content of her many bags even threatening to spill out. "Shinozaki Sayoko, Madam. Lady Illyasviel's personal assistant. It's a honor."

"Wow," Taiga chuckled, kind of awkwardly. "Nah, the honor's all mine, I guess... Hmmmm, you know, Illya-chan, I can't stop thinking you remind me of someone...?"

"Well, of course. I would remind you of Irisviel von Einzbern," Illya said, while Sayoko casually kicked away a fat guy in an all too small Speedo who looked like he went to the same barber as Dilbert's boss, holding a cellphone camera aimed at the little albino. He spun around the air gracefully and landed at the opposite side of the street while several other onlookers took video of him for Youtube. What an age, this.

"Oh, no, that couldn't be," Taiga kept on humming, rubbing her chin. "I never met Kiritsugu's wife, she died before he moved here."

"But you must have seen pictures of her," Illya pointed out.

"Well. now that you mention that..." Taiga had to paused uncomfortably as her eyes became dots. "I don't think I was ever shown any of those? Were you, Shirou?"

"I, I think those were all lost in the Fuyuki fire, Fuji-nee," the boy answered, carefully studying the now suspicious, borderline-spiteful expression on Illya's small cute face. Before long, however, she broke again into an apparently bright and cheerful smile. By now, Shirou had spent enough time with women to know that promised the most painful death Berserker could provide.

"Well, that's unfortunate, but what if we build our own happy memories together now, before we have to be apart, Oniichan?" she asked him. "Won't you show me your school now that I'm here? Come on...! It's the chance of your lifetime, you know!"

"Exactly when had the two of you met before, anyway?" Taiga curiously asked.

Saber interrupted with a gentle cough, saving Shirou in the nick of time as ever. "I agree with Illyasviel, Shirou, why don't we make sure to spend some quality time with her? After all, a child like she has to be kept under constant surveillance in a Carnival like this."

Shirou cringed. "Saber, don't you think you're doing a disservice to Shinozaki-san here? Besides, Illya-chan's other... servant might object, you know, the tall Greek gentleman who is her bodyguard..."

"Oh, he's always around, but he won't show up as long as I have no need for him," Illya boasted, tossing some of her long, silver-white hair back, again making a few certain heads in the moving crowd to turn around. Geez, she thought, Japan really was full of Lolicons. "Forget that, Oniichan, I'm here today only to have fun, preferably with you. Of course, your little sis will get angry at you if you don't want to play..."

"Shirou, please, don't even think of turning away a charming young lady's request," Taiga chided. "Ah!" she snapped her fingers. "I know! Illya-chan, you remind me... of Negi-kun!"

Illya shuddered for a moment as if a jolt of electricity had just hit her. "... who?" she forced herself to smile at Taiga a second later.

"Oh, I'll be sure to introduce him to you later today," Taiga chuckled, her eyes going briefly catlike while she placed a hand on her own mouth. "Why, I think you'd make a lovely couple! He really needs to start hanging around people his same age and height, if you ask me..."

"Oh, Illyasviel is actually a few years older than she appears, Professor," Saber casually pointed out.

"Well, yes, the same easily could be said about you, 'Cousin'!" Illya nearly screeched.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"But, this must hold no thrill whatsoever for you," Harumi told Satomi while they walked deeper inside through the narrow halls of the darkened manor, the floor creaking under them with each step. Sakurako led the formation with mischievous glee, and to contain her urges to tug on her tail, Abiru had resorted to constantly tug on the tail of the ermine perched on Negi's shoulder. Chamo withstood it stoically, since in all honesty he even was starting to enjoy it. "I mean, you designed this place, no way it's gonna hold any surprises for you."

"Oh, actually, I didn't work on the design of all the rooms," Hakase explained. "Since I wanted to observe my body's responses when faced with truly bizarre fight-or-flight situations, I asked Lala-san, Skuld and Haruna to work on a few chambers without me, just so I could experience a few surprises..."

"... poor, misguided fool..." Chisame said weakly.

Then, without any warning, a section of the ceiling collapsed, and from above, a body dropped! Literally falling on Negi, the rest of the party sprang back, Hakase and Chisame instinctively assuming battle ready stances and reaching for the cards hidden within their tops, but Kotaro, curiously, remained oddly tranquil, only chuckling at Negi. The Welsh boy, after quickly pushing off whatever had dropped on him, cried when he realized it was the still, limp body of none other but Konoe Konoemon, with a large red gap on his ever-strange looking head, and his eyes fully white.

"YEEEEEEE!" Negi yelled, hopping back, Chamo also leaping off him in terror. "MURDER!"

"Okay, Hakase, tell us this is one of the parts you worked on!" Chisame gasped, already pulling her card out and this close to activate it.

"Uhhh, no?" a very cold-blooded Satomi shrugged. "Ah, poor Konoka-san, she'll be crushed..."

Harumi's eyes sparkled. "This should give us almost a full free week...!"

"Is it worth losing the Festival, however?" Abiru impassively wondered.

Harumi thought it over. "Maybe we could go hit the beach instead? Close enough for me."

"Are, are you not believing this, or would this be your reaction to the Headmaster's actual death?!" Negi protested.

"... I don't think you'd like to hear the honest answer to that, Negi-sensei," Harumi honestly answered.

Kotaro laughed, slapping his knee as he flipped over the body with a foot. "Don't be so dumb! Anyone can see this is just a mannequin! It doesn't even smell like a fresh corpse would...!"

Harumi and Abiru, who had just been making honest-to-goodness summer break plans in the event of a violent murder, instantly gave the boy rooming with them matching horrified, stunned stares.

"... or so I've heard, anyway!" Kotaro coughed innocently, tilting his head aside.

"Kotaro-kun, tell me again why you're not living with your parents or any other relatives?" Harumi said, inching back a little.

Chisame sighed, tucking her card back into her top. "Okay, then, I guess this was kinda scary anyway... for a moment at least..."

"What is that thing, by the way?" Abiru asked her. "Why were you going to play Duel Monsters with the Headmaster's corpse?"

"More importantly," Harumi said, picking up the mannequin, "do you guys take commissions in this style? I can think of a few boys I'd like to have as-"

"Neeeeext room, Shiina!" Chisame requested.

* * *

Mahora students would often boast that whenever they threw a Festival, it could be heard all the way into outer space, but that, like the story about the Great Wall, was only an exaggeration, of course.

In outer space, no one can hear you party. Though Superman could lip-read the party reasonably well.

A sleek, fraggin wicked' death machine, the undisputed queen of all METAL motorcycles in all Biker Circuits of the known universe, sat suspended next to a small asteroid, between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter (contrary to popular belief, the asteroid belt is actually pretty roomy), while its proud owner and rider checked on the distant blue planet that was his current target through spiffy, state-of-art last gen cosmic binoculars some unfortunate scientist had once passed to him before his untimely demise. Behind the towering, black leather-clad, smelly juggernaut at the wheel sat his much more delicate passenger, a shapely, hourglass-figured bespectacled blonde and all around genius, with an utterly mortified look on her face.

"How much longer?" Tearju Lunatique asked again, audible thanks to the self-perpetuating atmospheric field the Space Hawg 666 constantly created in its immediate vicinity so its driver and his occasional live prisoners- and even more occasional contractors who for some reason or another were foolish enough as to travel with him- could breathe through trips that lasted objective (light) years, even when they only lasted subjective hours.

The black hearted bastitch who called the Hawg his only steady lady had assembled it himself many years ago. Despite of his reckless, savage and crude nature, the man only known as Lobo was a sheer genius whenever it came to designing means to inflict death and suffering upon others, surpassing even internet legislature and forum mods! You could have asked the rest of denizens from his homeworld, Czarnia, and they gladly would confirm it- had Lobo not massacred the whole lot of them (but one, but that's a story for another day, and might not be canonical to this one) for his high school graduation science project. And the Hawg was not only a speedy, effective means of intergalactic transportation, it was also loaded with enough weapons to wipe out most countries off the face of the Earth on its own, with the possible exception of Australia, but only because it was easy to lose track of what had already been wiped out there.

"Geez, Prof, how many times I hafta tell ya," the bounty hunter she had hired days ago to help retrieve her dau- er, prized creation from Earth growled, "you've gotta play patient when it comes to tailin' the pigs. Lazy bums take an eternity ta move their blue asses around, that's why we workin' class stiffs always run rings 'round 'em. You ask me, dem Green Lantern jamokes turned 'em even sissier by doing their job for 'em. Wait, wait! What a narratively happy coincidink, huh?" he grisly chuckled, as he saw a small ship zooming in a straight line past the asteroid field, leaving the Martian orbit behind. "That's them, awright. Now we can get on the move at last!"

"Only one?" Tearju doubted, looking through smaller binoculars of her own. "They know very well what is Eve able of! Frankly, I feel insulted."

"Well, what I heard when I was hackin' their com links before was, they gotta top agent stationed at the mudball ta help with the delivery," Lobo shrugged his wide and hairy shoulders. "Sharp-Eye Mihoshi, granddaughter of the Big Marshall hisself! Never faced her mesself, but it's 'bout damn time we danced." He licked all over his thick, curt lips, pocketing his binoculars into his open vest and readying his huge rusty hook and chain. "Hold yerself steady, Prof, here we go!"

The woman nodded, gulped as she hugged the mercenary's waist despite her apprehensions. He kept on chuckling as he felt the large breasts pressing against his back, and had he not been an ungrateful bastard he'd have thanked the Heavens space was so cold. Then he took off after the small police ship, entering the field of disruption left around it but keeping enough distance as to avoid detection (it helped the many ingenious and crafty artifacts built into the Hawg included several intended to interfere with police scanners).

The Galaxy Police, of course, had its own means to disrupt the radars of inferior civilizations, such as Earth's, so they easily could fly into unadministered space when necessary to perform Black Ops such as these. Lobo's tech didn't go quite that far, but by sticking close enough to the Police Ship, he also could slip past Earth's atmosphere undetected. He didn't want that nosy Boy Scout peeking into his milk run before the babe could get her widdle angel. Maybe after that Lobo would pick him up for a rumble, though. Those always were amusing for a while at least!

Completely oblivious to the infamous uber bastitch pursuing him, the sole crewman of the small Galaxy Police ship, a short humanoid with a rounded bald head and shiny yellow eyes, hummed absently to himself as he followed a perfectly straight, timely path towards his destination. In no time, he proudly thought, he would finally meet the famous Agent Kuramitsu, they would trade stories about their respective heroic deeds, he would impress her enough as to cause an excellent impression with her grandfather the Chief, and he would return covered in glory, with the feared Golden Darkness as his helpless prisoner. Oh yes, what a great day would that be...

Then his ship hit a small asteroid, and he shouted, "FUCK!"

The collision sent the ship crashing against another floating chunk of rock. "OH, YOU'VE GOTTA BE KIDDING ME...!"

The ship began flying erratically, in wide circles but still heading towards Earth, like a gigantic drunk mosquito. "JACO WILL NOT BE DENIED...!"

Lobo and Tearju both sweatdropped as they kept following him regardless. "Are... Are you sure that's actually a GP...? Those asteroids were thousands of miles apart! How does he keep hitting them all?"

"Eh," Lobo grunted. "Like I said, they ain't what they used ta be!"

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"Oh, what a shock. Another dead body," Harumi flatly commented as soon as they saw the fallen, blood-soaked body of Sakurazaki Setsuna in the middle of the next room. It was decorated like a cheap love motel, and 'blood' adorned the walls with phrases like 'you cheating cat!', 'ahhh! Onee-sama!' and 'Try Chao Bao Zi's special Festival Black Sausages!', although they'd tried to scrub that last one out.

Kotaro sniffed the air. "I don't know, girls. This one doesn't smell of plastic, like a mannequin." Of course, it did smell of artificial blood instead, but why tell them that?

"Please, Kotaro-kun," Abiru said. "That was amusing at first, but you should stop pretending you're some sort of trained bloodhound already. That isn't healthy," she chided before tugging on Chamo's tail once more.

"Since when do we have anything against Konoe?" Chisame wondered, looking down at Setsuna playing dead and marveling at how well she could hide her breathing in the shadows like some kind of Dark Souls extra. "Did she really approve of this?"

"Well, I know she approved of the display of her mother's dead image. That girl's got some issues, and a coffee table book or two to boot," Matoi commented, before sticking even closer to Chisame, who in turn shivered and took three steps further away from her.

Then a small, faintly glowing shape rose from Setsuna's frame, making Harumi and Abiru gasp and yelp. Negi, Satomi, Chisame and Kotaro only raised eyebrows while Sakurako giggled.

"I am..." the tiny, large-headed image of Setsuna spoke, in a playfully spooky tone, "the ghost of Sakurazaki Setsuna! Avenge my murder or I'll curse youuuuu!"

"Oh my God!" Abiru said. "Is this real?!"

Harumi, more of a rational, thinking woman, swallowed hard before recomposing herself. "D-Don't be silly, Abiru-chan, this has to be some sort of hologram with a recording of Sakurazaki-san's voice sounding all cutesy..."

"Are you sure it's not CGI?" Abiru said.

"No, CGI looks more realistic," Harumi said.

"Oh, you think I'm cutesy, Haruna-san's frieeeeend?!" Chibi Setsuna demanded, getting into the act as a stubby chubby hand pointed at the 3-F students. Of course, it only was working because they were two of the most relatively normal ones in the classroom. Chiri would simply have given Setsuna a forceful proper burial already. After all, she always carried a suspiciously red-stained shovel around. "No, I'm real! An avenging spirit from the graaaaaave!"

Abiru gulped and steeled herself. "E-Even if you were real, you can't scare us! We're 3-F! We're what nightmares fear!"

"I'll sic all the souls of the animals you petted and hugged and fondled and caressed to death on youuuuuu!" Chibi Setsuna booed. As Abiru broke into cold sweat, Chibi-Setsuna turned on the wide eyed Harumi. "As for you, as punishment for disrespecting me, I'll place the curse of Ishihara upon youuuuuuu!"

"NO, YOU DON'T SCARE US!" the girls still cried, hugging each other for support, plainly scared. "WE CAN'T BE AFRAID OF SOMETHING THAT SD!"

Chibi-Setsuna sighed and then, for the coup de grace, briefly changed into a perfect copy of Setsuna's actual, graceful and slim figure. This is something, after all, a practiced and powerful enough practitioner of the onmyoudou and their small creations can do for limited amounts of time, just like even the Chibi-turned Negi could do during the Kyoro ar- oh, right, that didn't happen in this adaptation. Well, it could've happened anyway had things gone that path. Regardless, the now non-Chibi Setsuna threw her head back and melodramatically wailed, "I won't know peace until I'm avenged...! ISHIHARA...!"

"YAAAAAAAAA!" Abiru and Harumi screamed, bolting immediately towards the next room, literally trampling all over the poor Setsuna on the floor, who barely had the time to scream a stifled short interjection.

"... ooops. Sorry about that, Master!" Chibi-Setsuna sweated, popping back into her Super Deformed form and looking down at her originator's twitching, groaning body.

"Ah! Setsuna-san, are you okay?!" Negi grew alarmed.

Kotaro sniffled. "That... That was kind of beautiful..."

"I thought you didn't like it when ladies were harassed or mistreated, you little punk?" Chisame frowned.

"Oh, I hate it when men do it, because we aren't supposed to, but I have no problem when a girl puts another girl in her right place, and believe me, those Nee-sans aren't half as bad as most of their class, but-"

Matoi bopped a fist against the back of his head. "That's my class you're talking about, boy. It's true, granted, but still my class, blast you..."

"Well, as long as I'm here, shall we move on to the fanservice portion of the segment?" Chibi-Setsuna said coquetishly, turning sideways and unbuttoning her shirt to bare one shoulder, winking at them.

A flyswatter knocked her out of the air. "Damn it, what have I told you about doing that?!" Setsuna demanded angrily, finally breaking character. "Ugh, sorry, Sensei, I guess I'm really out of practice. I swear, my paper doubles didn't use to be perverts."

"I had to!" Chibi-Setsuna wailed, a full-body grid pattern covering her from the flyswatter. "It's the only way I'll ever get an appearance around here! I demand more screentime! More screentime, more screentime!"

"Did Deadpool bite you at some point?" Kotaro said, backing away from the Chibi. "Because you sound suspicously like him..."

* * *

Some would have said it was a miracle for Yuuki Nao to ever attend church, but the truth was, she actually rather liked churches. Not because she had any faith left anymore. When she had started visiting the Mahora Mary Magdalene Church, shortly after the brutal assault on her mother, she had prayed with faith, looking for the relief Buddishm and Shinto had denied her. When she felt that faith had failed her as well, however, she had stuck around, even if erratically, simply because she actually liked the iconography and the peace of the Holy House. Nao didn't like crowds; she found them obnoxious, which was why that morning she was one of two souls in Mahora to hang around the church instead of joining the festivities. Also, she'd found out that this was a place where she could set dates over her phone without Mikan nagging her or Rito preaching at her about morality.

Rito. Who had a girlfriend like the crazy skank now, and the alien slut, now sluts plural. What a joke.

Often, Nao toyed with the idea of becoming a nun after finishing her studies, so she'd have a steady income and home without really having to work, much less ever marry a man (in the carnal sense, anyway). She more or less understood, however, a nun still had to work more than it was apparent at first sight, which was why she hadn't decided on the subject yet. As it was, right now, the young redhead would simply sit in silence under the shadow of a wide tree close to the temple's entrance, clad in shorts, sandals, a light tee-shirt and a red baseball cap, enjoying life as the God she didn't believe in had intended it, checking on her text messages and-

The ground shook with the sound of the impact. Nao, who was as lazy as they came but also had sharp survival instincts, lifted her head and stared past the road leading to the church and the first line of neatly arranged bushes limiting the woods, darkened now with dust thrown up, although probably not enough as for it to be visible from campus proper. Nao doubted the Festival goers had even heard the noise over the sounds of their fireworks and their annoying music. Before she could even think about it, she was running towards the impact site.

Because, while Nao's survival instincts were sharp indeed as mentioned, her curiosity was even sharper. As was her self-confidence. She was fairly sure that, if there was something really weird to be seen there, she could take a few pics of it and sell them after bolting away, assuming there was any danger at the site. Enough extra money meant a little less effort on seducing disgusting pigs and scamming them of their money before they went too far.

She was fairly sure she heard the priest on duty at the church peeking out and then running out after her with surprising speed for a man who was normally so quiet and slow moving, but then again he was still sort of young. And not that Nao really cared either way. As long as he didn't stop her from taking juicy pics to trade, she wouldn't mind Father Kirei tagging along. He was creepy, but still less bothersome than the average man.

Funnily enough, he was not in habit right now, but clad in a form fitting black shirt (he was better built than Nao had ever imagined before, too), and an apron over his pants, with a bandana hat on. Now Nao remembered he used to dress up like that for Festivals, as he'd close the church early to go sell the sizzling radioactive waste he passed off as mapo tofu at the festivities.

The source of the noise appeared to be a small impact crater in the first few stretches of woodland, surrounded by a few toppled and broken trees. There wasn't really enough time for Nao to get a good look at the crater while stopping by, as she was distracted by the sight of the girl in what could be charitably called ragged clothing walking away from it.

"Kugimiya-kun?" Nao heard the calm, smooth voice of Father Kirei coming from behind her, far closer than she'd have expected it, which made her all kinds of uncomfortable. She looked back at him over her shoulder.

"You know her?"

"A good shepherd knows all sheep in his flock," the man with the very deep eyes intoned seriously. Which as a matter of fact didn't actually answer the question, as he didn't fancy himself a good shepherd, but still sufficed the fool the girl as he'd expected. As a matter of fact, he only thought he knew the mostly bare young woman because she would often come along with Kakizaki, who was in the church's choir, out of pure vanity and desire to show her voice off rather than any piety.

The mostly naked girl noticed them, and spoke, sounding nothing like Kakizaki's classmate. "I'm sorry, what?" Not only were their voices different, but this girl spoke Japanese with a faint but unfamiliar accent. Other differences in their appearances became apparent at second and later glances.

"Please forgive me," the man who fathomed himself unforgivable amicably said, walking closer under Nao's suspicious glare. "For a moment, I mistook you for a young lady I happen to know. May I ask if you are you all right?" he asked.

"Never mind, she obviously is," Nao muttered rather disrespectfully. "What I want to know is, did you do _that_?" she demanded, pointing at the crater.

The girl looked back at the crater, paused for several moments as if attempting to decipher something that puzzled her in a quite profound level, then looked back to Nao with a bland expression. "You could say that. And yes, as you can see, I am quite all right."

"Quite," Kirei stoically agreed, for while his heart could find solace in nothing but evil now, and that included a lack of interest in sex per se, he was still a man and not one prone to outright denial of reality.

"Yeah, well, except for your clothes," Nao replied, genuinely upset by this girl's 'no big deal' attitude. She still held to some standards, actually more than those she thought she had, and she found junkies, druggies, furries, Twilightards and politicians to be disgusting. And who else would walk around a church naked during a festival while sporting no expression?

Behind her, a naked Takane D. Goodman sighed as she headed into the church to retrieve one of her many stashes of extra clothes hidden around campus.

Now the girl looked down. "Indeed," she said, considering her ruined garments. "It would seem the miracle- whatever it was- did not preserve them."

"Then, come, poor lost child. The House of the Lord will supply you some spare robes," Kirei offered, magnanimously beckoning towards the church.

The girl's head snapped up, and there was something very strange in her eyes. "That's very generous... we haven't even been introduced."

"'For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me,'" Kirei quoted, repeating his beckoning gesture.

Then the stranger failed to outright answer, seeming to study Kirei's own expression or lack thereof carefully, while Nao frowned and glanced back and forth between them. If Nao had been asked then, she might have said it looked to her like that girl would normally have gladly outright accepted the words she had just heard, but that there was something about the priest that kept her from doing so instantly. But when she finally spoke, taking a step towards them, her voice was still soft and somehow fragile. "'And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.' The very least," she concluded. "My name is Karin."

"Karin what?" Nao huffed, folding her arms.

"Just Karin will do," the weirdo replied, starting to follow the impassive Father across the road.

"Oooh-kay," Nao decided to tag along, just to see what happened next. As we just said, she was quite curious. "I'm Yuuki Nao," she said on a whim. "Nice to meetcha. I guess, Just-san." For the honor of her fam– er, well, let's say for the honor of Mikan, since she really didn't care about the rest of the family per se, she could not let a straight line like that go unanswered!

"That's a nice sounding name," Karin nodded, and said nothing else. Mostly because she honestly couldn't think of anything at all to tell her. She didn't even have a solid idea of what she was doing there, not to mention where that 'there' was to begin with.

Still, as things stood right then, she felt all the same she would eventually have to kill someone. Right after figuring out exactly what had happened to her.

* * *

"I designed this one myself!" Satomi's voice said with swelling pride as they stood in a featureless completely black room. At least, Chisame thought it was featureless since there was nothing in sight anywhere, but then again, there were no lights whatsoever in the whole room and nobody could see anything at all, so who knew for sure, other than Hakase?

Yes, it was that most cheaty of animation cheats, even worse than the clip show montage: the totally black screen.

"And..." Harumi's voice said, "this is scary, because...?"

"It's a metaphor of the greatest horror constantly hanging over all of mankind. The one from which there is no escape and there will never be," Satomi's voice lectured. "The absolute fact that is scariest than any monsters or afterlife horrors our imagination can picture. The crushingly sad and devastating realization in the end we all will be reduced to nothingness, cast into endless nonexistence forever. To make the experience more complete and akin to being in a state of absolute absence of existence, I also wanted to incorporate sound nullifiers to render the visitors fully unable to hear anything or anyone, but Skuld-san axed the idea."

"Of course she did!" Chisame's voice said. "Then there'd be no way at all to navigate through this room, much less to come out of it without running into a wall dozens of times first!"

Satomi's voice grumbled. "That's perfectly surmountable with enough determination and orientation, she was only upset I defied her silly beliefs of a so-called superior-"

"What in the... Tsunetsuki, take your hand off my butt!" Chisame's voice protested.

"Sorry, Chisame-sama!"

"You still aren't taking it off!"

"Y-Yes I did!"

"What?! No, you didn't, it's still there!"

"But I did, Chisame-sama!"

"Ooops, sorry," Harumi's voice said as Chisame felt a hand quickly being pulled away from her ass. "I thought I was touching someone else. Geh, you aren't my type, thank you very much!"

"... who did you think you were touching, Haru-nee?" Kotaro's voice asked.

"A lady never touches and tells, Kotaro-kun," Abiru's voice said.

"Th-There are _two_ hands on my rear now!" Negi yelped.

"Why, Kotaro-kun...!" Harumi crooned teasingly.

"What?! I'm not touching anyone! My hands are being held high in the air, and even if they weren't, I'd never touch another man's ass!"

Chisame was heard sizzling in anger, and then there was the noise of a slap. "This time it WAS you, Tsunetsuki!"

"Guilty as charged!" Matoi's voice admitted. "But Chisame-sama, I think you just hit-"

"Wh-Why me?!" Negi's voice cried. "My face is all the way down here, how id you even hit me?"

"Ah, sorry, Sensei!" Chisame's voice gasped. "It, it was an honest mistake, for real!"

"And there are still two hands on my rear! One of them is even squeezing, now!" Negi's voice claimed.

"... Kobushi-sempai, please stop tugging on my tail while nobody's looking," Sakurako's voice soberly said as she finally let go of Negi's ass.

"Sorry, I thought I was reaching for Chamo-san's," Abiru piously said.

"On second thought, perhaps this room WAS a bad idea after all," Satomi's voice admitted as she also let go of Negi's ass.

"Oh, I don't know, I think it'll be one of the most popular with the crowds anyway..." Harumi's voice hummed, while she reached for Kotaro's ass...

... but ended up squeezing Matoi's instead.

* * *

 _The Church:_

"Well, it's a good thing that old school uniform we found fits you," Kirei said, as he served both girls sitting at his table a steaming fresh breakfast. Nao had already eaten that morning, courtesy of Mikan before she left for the Festival with Rito and Lala, but she wasn't going to complain about an extra free meal. "And I'm sure Kasuga-kun won't mind we had to sneak into her bedroom and raid through her wardrobe for it. We'll need to have to have a long conversation with her regarding those magazines and devices, however."

"Fret not," Karin assured him, as she began to dig into her mapo tofu. "Should that transpire, this other gift will answer nicely." With that, she reached back to almost caress the shaft of the long hammer strapped to her back. It was sort of funny, Nao thought, how it and the strap had survived her… impact without a scratch on while her garments had become pretty much nothing. "I would prefer to have a sword as well, but I suppose it's a bit ridiculous for a church to have a supply of those in this peaceful place and times."

"Yes, ridiculous," Kirei, a man with a dozen swords on his person and more in every single page of his personal Bible, said.

"Yeah, well, about that," Nao began, then half-shrieked as her tongue felt like catching on fire with her first bite. "Ow! Ow, ow, ow, what the hell! This thing's too damn spicy!"

"Seriously?" Karin quietly asked while slowly chewing on the contents of her plate. "I think it is just plain delicious. My congratulations to the chef."

Kirei smiled while sitting down to join the meal. "Duly accepted and thanked. Also, please restrain yourself from employing that sort of language in this holy house, Yuuki-kun."

"Whatever, who eats spicy tofu for breakfast anyway?" the redhead made a face, pushing her plate towards Karin, who accepted it quickly, setting it right next to her own.

"I will not forget your charity, Father," Karin assured the man, now sounding much more respectful of him.

"I should hope not," he answered with a tranquil nod, "but if you really wish to thank me, you could start by answering the questions I'm obligated to ask you now. What are the reasons you came here, and why you do seem to need that hammer so badly?"

Now Karin did turn to look at him, a somewhat puzzled expression on her face, before taking a first sip from her cup of steaming black coffee, and finding it sublime as well. "Well, I suppose that there's no harm in telling you. Truth be told, I don't even remember why I am here, or what I was doing exactly before being sent this way. I have faint, somewhat contradictory memories of where I was before losing awareness and waking up by your church. I seem to remember an all consuming white light, and I remember a betrayal."

"Curious and curiouser," Kirei hummed, eyes closed as he enjoyed his mapo tofu.

Nao tasted her coffee and cringed. "Even this is just too hot and bitter. What the hell happened to your tastebuds?"

"I do remember, however," Karin added, "everything about this hammer. It was given to me, long ago, by someone whose company I craved above all others. It was her weapon of choice for me, and as such, I cherished it, and I learned to master it even better than a sword."

"Then why would you have liked a sword better?" Nao mumbled her question.

"Because it's far easier and swifter to kill with a sword, no matter your choice of the hammer as a non-lethal instrument," Karin smoothly replied.

"Oh. Right," Nao said.

"Rather interesting," Kirei nodded. "May we know the name of that person who meant so much to you? Perhaps we happen to know each other. In the course of an active life, one acquires odd connections."

Karin paused, studying him again, before deciding, Supreme Chef or not, she still didn't like him that much. "My apologies, but I'd rather keep that closer to my chest."

"Understandable, I suppose," Kirei allowed. "We all have our little necessary mysteries and secrets. Well, I should be going to wash these plates and cups," he said while standing up and picking the silverware. "And after that, write a detailed report of these fascinating events. Although I highly doubt anyone will look at them until the Festival is over. Still, paperwork is one of the most sacred parts of our duties and just cannot be overlooked."

Karin perked up, just a little, from her aloof coldness. "A Festival?" she asked.

Nao grunted. "The annual Festival of Mahora, of course. Wasn't that why you were here in the first place?"

"Mahora," Karin said carefully. "So I am at Mahora. And I… I think I remember a Festival of sorts, from shortly before I lost consciousness. A Babylon of festivities with visitors from across the world, with lots of individuals being stripped bare, before devolving into heaving masses of rutting carnality…"

"So you were doing hard drugs with your friends at some orgy while getting ready for the Festival," Nao deduced apathetically. "See? We're making progress now. Just wait a few hours until the drugs have fully passed by and I'm sure you'll remember everything."

"Perhaps," Kirei thoughtfully said. "In the meanwhile, why don't you be a good Christian and show Karin-san the surroundings while I write my report, Yuuki-kun? That might jolt her memories back."

"I'm not a Christian," Nao reminded him. "And shouldn't you be retaining her here until you've figured her deal out? Are you sure it's wise to send an innocent young student away with an amnesic drug whore?"

"I'm not on drugs," Karin said.

"A House of the Lord is not a prison, Yuuki-kun," Kirei said from where he was diligently washing the dishes now. "Anymore. But if you don't wish to show Karin-san around, that's only for you to decide."

Nao frowned, looked at the man's wide back, then looked at Karin, who just sat there with a stoic silence and lack of expression. "Like hell I'm scared of you, junkie," she said, standing up and gesturing for her to come along. "Let's go, I'll show you how to have a real good time."

Karin simply nodded and followed her outside.

After they were gone, Kirei calmly finished the dishes, closed the front gates, and slowly walked back towards the Chapel. As he stood before the Christ on His cross, with his arms folded behind his back, there was a hiss in the air, and his Servant materialized shortly behind him.

 _ **"That wassssssss one of the bigesssssst sssssssinssss, a ccccchallenge to deathhhhh, the arrival of a criminal like none elssssssse…"**_ The skeletal Judge hovered around Kotomine, long tongue snaking out of his bony jaw and twisting with each dragged word. ** _"An immortal, I can sssssssee, sssssomeone who'ssssss dared to try and essssscape the fffffffate dictated for all living beingsssss…"_**

"Oh, so that's what she is," Kirei pondered. "I suspected as much."

 _ **"I grow impatient, Padre!"**_ the Judge raised his inhuman voice. _**"I wasssssss promisssssed a masssssacre beyond my wildesssssst imaginationsssss, and I ssssssee you doing nothhhhing but ssssstalling, hhhhholding my hhhhhhand! Are you afffffraid, jussssst like all otherssssss, Padre? Maybe I ssssshould look for a new Masssssster…"**_

"Maybe," another voice said from the shadows at the other end of the chapel, "he would trust you if you hadn't given such a poor showing against Saber, mongrel."

The Judge hissed as he twirled to float behind Kirei, staring at the newly arrived man with evident poison and vitriol behind the visor of his helmet, which covered all of his face but the skull-like jawline. Kirei smiled as he turned around, facing the blond man who now strolled confidently towards him.

"Welcome back, Gilgamesh," he greeted the closest thing he had to a friend. "It's good to see you again. So. Any ideas on the identity of our young visitor?"

"None that I have bothered to examine, but what's the point of doing so?" the man, handsome beyond all imaginations, a perfectly sculpted Adonis with a cruel lingering smile, wearing a casual biking outfit, stood as a male model posing with his practice sword, the one he used while bored and going on trips, challenging the monsters of this era and seeing how long it took him to defeat them with only the crudest weaponry at hand. "She's not the woman I'm here for."

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Rance-sensei helped a lot with this wing," Sakurako explained as the group moved through a long series of linked rooms, all forming a staged display of a dark, grim and foreboding American city, full of incredibly accurate samples of Gothic architecture. Gargoyles seemed to lurk around each corner, and occasionally, out of the shadows, would spring a very realistic mannequin of some sort of costumed maniac or another. "Impressive, huh?"

"That's... certainly a word for it," Harumi said noncommittally. Right now they were marching through a depiction of a spooky field lined up with glowing Jack-O-Lanterns, while glowing red eyes would pretend to stare at them from the tall, thick artificial grass surrounding the narrow, twisted pathway. And every so often, a mechanic man, most often shirtless, always with large green spots all over his skin and with short vines circling their necks like collars, would leap at them from the shadows, waving false knives around while shouting a recorded 'FOR THE MISTRESS, FOR THE MISTRESS!' in English over and over. "I knew he was an American, but Gothamite? Well, I guess that explains why he's so creepy..."

After passing through the tangle of thicker vines at the exit of that room, over which lounged a sensual but sinister mannequin of a voluptuous redhead wrapped in false vegetation and nothing else, they walked into a room filled with all manners of dead stuffed birds, and decorated in a way that would have made Norman Bates eat his heart out. Kotaro almost yawned as Hitchcokian holograms of cawing, crazed ravens and magpies began flying at them from all directions, threatening to peck their eyes out only to harmlessly fly through them moments after.

"Even if you worked on these as well," Abiru pondered, frowning slightly as she was pulled along by Harumi from her distracted tug on a stuffed and mounted Australian emu's tail, "you guys are keeping a very cold attitude about this. I had no idea you were so... self-controlled."

Chisame shrugged, unable to explain that, after facing the actual Joker himself, going through a guided tour of an amusement park Gotham was no big deal at all. "They're just dolls, once they lose the element of surprise on you, what's there to fear about them?"

"I know, but still... I can't help feeling a bit uneasy around them," Harumi had to admit, rubbing herself up and down in an arm.

"Good, then the House of Terrors has succeeded in, you know, being an actual House of Terrors," Chisame said.

"But school haunted houses aren't supposed to be actually scary, they're supposed to be laughably bad, that's the whole point! Its supposed to be bad costumes, cheap sets and sponges on fishing rods to give people a cold feeling iin their neck!" Abiru opined, jumping back a bit after, before reaching the room's end, a lifelike dummy of a grotesque misshapen bird man cackled and waughed at them, waving a sharp looking blade protruding from the end of his black umbrella at them. "And couldn't that thing poke someone's eye out anyway?"

"Well, that surely would be a major problem for you, yeah," Chisame told Abiru.

"Chisame..." Negi quietly warned.

Abiru frowned. "I'm not one eyed, you know. This one works perfectly," she explained, lightly tapping on the thick gauze covering her whole left eye, "it's just... oh, never mind. You have as little interest on hearing it as I have on telling you."

"You got that right," Chisame sagely nodded, ignoring the soft but stern glare Negi was giving her over their back and forth. "Say, Shiina, how many of these Gotham rooms are there in this house anyway?"

"Rance-sensei designed thirteen of them, fittingly enough," Satomi explained. "We've just visited the Nygma, Tetch, Isley and Cobblepot rooms, and this one is the Waylon Jones Southern Discomfort Chamber." She said this as they waddled through the murky water going up past their ankles in this room. It was like navigating across an ominous Southern swamp, only illuminated by the glow of fake fireflies perched on the thick foliage that covered the ceiling. Several pillars had been heavily retouched to look like tall and twisted trees from the Bayou, and occasionally, a small robotic alligator would swim around them, loudly chomping on the air before zooming back out of sight. Kotaro just yawned louder, although something, for some reason or another, was starting to make him very slightly nervous...

"Yeah, after this, it's the Pyg and Zsasz Rooms, and I must warn you, they're really nasty-nya," Sakurako said. "Anyone wanting to get back, please say it so now..."

"If we could take the horror Alice in Wonderland set back there, we can take that, too," Harumi confidently said, even though she was growing slightly, irrationally uneasy as well. Not that she could show it before 3-A and Kotaro. "Just lead on, sister!"

"Okay, nya, don't say I never warned you then..." Sakurako threw her hands up while they kept on waddling towards the green scaled reptilian behemoth guarding the exit.

As they did, however, they failed to notice something actually staring at them from the depths of the darkness, with blank, cold, inhuman even, eyes.

Sticking to the decorations, always keeping their distance, the large, dark figure kept on darting silently after them, following them through all too familiar sights and wondering what in the world was wrong with today's youth, making pop culture icons out of serial murderers. Especially after facing several of those killers themselves recently.

Then again, the living shadow allowed to itself, perhaps it was their own way to cope with the trauma, to reassure themselves they had prevailed over insanity itself and were not afraid of facing it directly.

That was why _he_ kept a giant Joker card in his basement, after all. It gave him a lot of motivation on leg day.

This foreigner continued following the boy and his companions, waiting for the right moment to contact them openly, of letting them know why he had just marched back into their lives.

It was not, however, a moment he was looking forward to.

On the upside, at least giant vampire moon rabbits would not be involved this time.

Hopefully.

* * *

 **To be Continued!**


	2. The Soothing White Festival

_Elsewhere:_

Until less than three months ago, Fujimaru Ritsuko had never seen a Servant, unless you counted that old guy who always followed the Director around in a tuxedo until the Director was, well, dead.

Oh, she had heard all about them during the long and grueling study sessions, during the nights spent up studying to no apparent avail. She, just like her twin brother, had been a bad learner in that she had been unable to carry most of her theoretical studies into any sort of practical application, but that hadn't meant she, unlike her twin brother, had never tried. Her Magic Circuits were simply subpar, her teachers had estimated, before moving on, leaving her (and her twin brother) aside to focus on her more gifted classmates.

The cranky old jewelcraft instructor lady had once told her she was more useless than idiot, which was kinda hurtful. She also had told her twin brother he was equally useless and idiotic, which had, as usual, slipped off him as if it had been nothing, but Ritsuko was not at all like Ritsuka in that regard. After being told that, her will deflated, she had, indeed, turned into more of a slacker (just like her twi- okay, okay, we'll stop it for now), barely pulling any weight in the Organization, but even then, her disillusionment had never made her lose her sense of wonder at the mere idea of Servants. She had kept on dreaming of the day when she would finally meet one in the flesh, even if they were not hers to summon.

Now she (and her twin brother, sorry, but it had to be said) had actually done it, she… was not sure about the results.

Ritsuka and Ritsuko were twins, as you should know damn well by now after how much we've repeated it, but hardly identical. She was fairly shorter than him, and she sported light orange locks of hair that tended to flow down, opposite to her brother's wilder, spikier black hair, which always seemed wanting to spring around in all directions. He was fairly lean and finely toned, while she was more petite and rounded, prompting her to keep on watching her weight almost constantly. Since getting into Chaldea, however, she had been having no shortage of physical activity, meaning she was rather fit and svelte at the time.

If the twins were alike in something, it was in how... normal and average they were. On their own, apart from each other, they were often described as being just as nondescript. They tended to blend in crowds, never standing out, and if people ever remembered them at all it was just because they were nice enough to everyone, but they were hardly ever paid any actual, major attention. Until recently, at the very least, when they had been picked up for a joint internship at a high-paying secret organization.

When they were together, however, the twins began acting very different from each other, even if because of contrast. Leonardo could tell from the first time she met them they brought something out of each other... something that was not necessarily their best or worst, but something that defined them beyond the nice agreeable ciphers most people usually saw them, in any instance. Ritsuko in particular seemed often irked by her brother's tendency to repeat the obvious and ask things that should have been clear, and in turn Ritsuka seemed to easily grow exasperated by his sister's somewhat impulsive habits and sporadic but increasing tendency to molest anything female with an expression best described as a 'rape-face'.

"So, should we be worried? I mean, is it that bad?" Fujimaru Ritsuka asked, standing side by side with his sister.

The orange-haired girl gave the boy a slight frown that he ignored as his attention was focused on Leonardo, the Renaissance Caster. The black haired woman, a dead ringer for the world famous image of the Mona Lisa, although packing a body that wouldn't quit under the point where our references of Gioconda cut off, stood behind them and their Servants in the gigantic chamber where an over-sized, rotating and glowing model of Earth pulsed with ever-renewing life, the glowing light that pumped through the Chaldea mystic systems. It was a truly impressive and majestic sight, and every time the siblings were there, they couldn't help but feel humbled enough they would cut their brief, rapid spats to the absolute minimum. It helped Leonardo also kept Ritsuko trapped in that giant steam punk gauntlet she had to keep her out of arms reach.

Chaldea had been created from a reproduction of Earth's own soul, using the Code of Yggdrasil as a template. Its originators had hardly been the Mage of the Beginning, but they had made a commendable work within their limitations of time and budget. Da Vinci knew that well, and thus also was all too aware of the implications of what would happen to them if that Earth currently on display died before their eyes, while still linked to it, and before they could cut their links to it.

"Not yet, as this Leyshift crisis hasn't fully manifested itself for the time being," the Caster finally answered, after double checking the current data on her miniature portable screens once again. "This Earth's lights are dying down, and its soul remains strong, but troubled nonetheless. In any instance, since we have decided to be more proactive after the Grand Caster's declaration of purpose, we would like it if you were to travel there regardless, find the root of the problem, and shoot it down before that world falls."

A tall, thin young man with light brown hair, which was long but conveniently kept tied back into a thick ponytail, stood side by side with Leonardo, also running scans on the latest parallel world the Chaldea crew had located. "This one seems to be a Singularity akin to the first one you ran into, Ritsuka-kun, but somewhat different in that Fuyuki City was fully destroyed during the Fourth Grail War's climax."

"Then where's that Fifth Grail War taking place, Doctor Roman?" asked another girl, who stood directly behind Ritsuka. She had light short hair, which fell in bangs that hid most of her cute rather than gorgeous pale face, and wore a form hugging black ensemble of body armor that actually showed off a lot of her curvaceous, rather well-stacked physique, complete with tall boots. In her hand she held a gigantic thick shield that looked like someone had taken a massive table apart and started carrying it around for protection. It was easily bigger than Ritsuka, never mind the young woman herself.

Leonardo leaned aside to share a look at the data the slightly effeminate looking scientist was checking and re-checking on, then to frown slightly, somewhat puzzled. "Apparently, it is being fought at some nearby city called... Mahora? How curious, I don't remember ever reading on that name before..."

In the chamber, thunder boomed ominously.

"Kintoki, what have I told you about using your Noble Phantasm indoors?" Dr. Roman cried towards the door.

"Sorry, doc!"

* * *

 _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ is the creation and intellectual property of Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha.

 _Fate/Grand Order_ is the creation and intellectual property of Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon.

Thanks to Shadow Crystal Mage for the proofreading and editing.

 **You Broke My Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Two: It's a Brave New Frontier! FGO 2017 Mahora Memory- The Soothing White Festiva** l.

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"What was that, Saber?" Shirou asked after noticing his Servant had just stopped behind him in the middle of the constantly moving crowd, still with a cone of mostly devoured cotton candy in each hand.

The blonde shook her head, as if to snap herself out of the brief spell of sorts she had just experienced, a strange feeling she couldn't quite explain. "N-No, it's nothing, Shirou, I was just- Oh. Rin, Sakura," she suddenly shifted gears, making Shirou's head snap back the other way. "Good morning to both..."

Illyasviel smirked as she saw the two sisters approaching them down the street, coming to greet them in matching bikinis, Rin's red, Sakura's white, and elegant sandals. "Why, but what a happy fortuitous meeting, Fujimura-sensei, Emiya-kun," Rin said with a calculated pleased smile. "And even Saber-san, too..."

"H-Hello, Sensei, Sempai, and, umm, Miss? Ma'am?" Sakura forced a nervous smile and nod, trying her best not to look too much at the strange and pale little girl who held Shirou's hand. Moments ago, Vigilante and Monster had detected not only Saber's by now familiar proximity, but that of a much more powerful Servant, and that had prompted the Tohsaka sisters to head over and see what was happening. Right now, Sakura could feel Monster's spiritual presence uneasily, almost frantically, shifting and circling around her, as if terrified of what she could feel around the child, and the youngest Tohsaka knew that meant a lot, seeing how Monster's usual inclination for saving as much energy as possible made her regularly very quiet, and often borderline lethargic.

"Ah, girls, how are you doing?" Taiga happily said. "Looking just great, I see! I assume you haven't met Saber's little cousin from Europe yet? This is Illyasviel-chan, and that's her nanny Sayoko-sama..."

"Just a personal aide, and 'Sayoko-san' will suffice nicely enough," Sayoko humbly said, but the sisters, mostly Rin, were too startled as to listen to her, instead focusing wide eyes on Illya.

"An… an Einzbern?!" Rin had to gasp despite herself.

"A pure blooded one indeed!" Illya bowed with a mischievous look in her eyes. "And you would be Tohsaka Tokiomi's daughters, wouldn't you, Big Sis?"

"Wow, Illya-chan," Taiga blinked. "You'd heard about them already? From Saber-san, right?"

"Not quite," Illya kept on smiling at the stunned Tohsakas, "but I've heard much about them anyway. Our families once used to be... associates..."

Rin felt a wave of cold sweat running down her forehead, after which she stared mutely at Shirou and Saber, silently demanding to know what the hell where they doing, happily sightseeing with a fucking Einzbern of all people. Neither of them answered her stare with a particularly meaningful one, which only upset her inwardly even more.

Out of all the lousy mornings, this one only could get any worse if-

 _No! Don't even think it!_ her common sense warned her a second later, a second too late. For almost as soon as she had given life to that idle idea, she heard the obnoxious, annoying laugh from someone just turning around a corner to meet them, a smaller figure dutifully marching behind her.

"Ohhhh ho ho ho!" laughed a tall, statuesque blonde who was even shapelier than Sakura, finely toned feminine muscle in a tiny white bikini that made Shirou's eyes go tiny at first sight, and Illya to cringe in disgust. At least until she noticed the short, demure looking black haired girl in a purple one-piece humbly standing behind the buxom hyena with drills in her hairdo, and Illya's expression shifted into quiet, intrigued curiosity for some reason unknown even to her. "My my, but if it isn't Tohsaka Rin! What an unusual venue is this, for our re-encounter after so many months, ho ho!"

"... good morning, Luvia-san," Sakura gave a small nod her way. "Miyu-chan, too. It's been a while, yes."

"Nowhere enough if you ask me," Rin grumbled to herself before straightening up, quickly retaking her act with a forced smile. She also tried her best to ignore Vigilante's sudden, constant screams and calls to arms in her ear, even if that sounded so pleasant now Luvia was here. "No, of course that's just a joke. Finnish humor for the greatest Finland has ever been able to produce, right? Everyone, please meet Luviagelita Edefelt, my roommate while studying abroad, and her nanny, Miyu-san..."

"Nanny?" Luviagelita frowned.

"I'm Master's personal aide, and just 'Miyu-chan' will suffice, as you know, Miss Rin... ah..." the dark haired little girl had finally raised her head enough as to catch a good view of Illyasviel. As their eyes met, the world seemed to abruptly stop in its tracks, while the breeze seemed to just as abruptly bring Sakura petals that lightly rained all over the scene, a soft, lovely piece called _Shojo no Shukumei_ lingering around the encounter, much to the growing confusion of Saber and the invisible Berserker, Vigilante, Destroyer and Monster.

Miyu stared into Illya's eyes.

Illya stared into Miyu's eyes.

'BA-BUMP! BA-BUMP!' their hearts went.

Saber finally just shrugged and finished eating the last of her cotton candy.

Next to them, the karaoke machine finished playing _Shojo no Shukumei_ and moved on to the next song, about a girl whose eyes made the stars looked like they'd stopped shining.

Not too far away, a green one-piece clad, barefoot Takamachi Nanoha paused in her task of tossing water filled balloons at the 'dunk the clown in the tank' game. "Ah!" she sighed for the benefit of the ferret sitting on her shoulder. "Did you feel that, Yuuno-kun? I can't quite explain it, but it felt soooo nice...!"

The ferret made a few short noises that probably tried to convey he hadn't felt anything at all.

* * *

 _The English Research Society's Haunted House, a.k.a. Sayo's Secret Lovenest:_

"Take... Take me back to the Joker's stage, please!" Fujiyoshi Harumi pleaded.

This was definitely the most terrifying thing she had ever seen, and from the current width of Abiru's only exposed eye, the H-mangaka could see her classmate thought the same. Before them, Kotaro-kun, Negi and his roommates sat the older girl's homeroom teacher, in an otherwise perfectly normal traditional Japanese room, smiling at them over a small table and a fragrant cup of just brewed tea. Tatami mats covered the floor, a teapot heated over a small hotplate, flower prints made up the walls and there was a vintage movie poster for the original _Gojira_.

"So you've been enjoying the house, have you?" Itoshiki Nozomu happily asked, his smile positively radiant and brightening the room in the middle of the otherwise dark and twisted manor. "That's just wonderful, youth should be greatly enjoyed after all. Isn't it great, this is such a sunny and warm day, with no rainclouds in the sky, attendance is sure to be very high! Heh heh, that's right, let's be positive about this! About everything, as a matter of fact! Konoemon-sensei was right, keeping a positive outlook on life is just what I needed all these years! I promise from now on I'll fill your lessons with nothing but hope and-"

"YAAAAHHHHHHH!" the scared-out-of-their-minds Abiru and Harumi bolted up to their feet and ran out the door, directly into the next room where they would find something safe and pleasant like a maniac armed with a chainsaw or broken bodies hanging from meat hooks.

Negi gulped nervously, then smiled shakily at his colleague. "W-Well, Itoshiki-sensei, congratulations! I must admit I had some doubts you could adapt to this role, but now I see you are a very gifted actor!"

"Oh?" Itoshiki now smiled at him, just as sweetly. "Negi-sensei, do you really think I'm acting? Heh heh, what a silly young man, just like your noble father. I have truly seen the light, I'll be this way forever and ever, and I'll make sure to bring the same happiness to all of Ala Alba...!"

Negi, Chamo, Chisame, Sakurako and Satomi stared at him in newfound primal horror, then quickly ran after the 3-F students, screaming their heads off.

As soon as they were gone, Itoshiki made a really miserable face as he rubbed the corners of his mouth, where a deep frown now replaced his happy-go-lucky smile. "Doing this thing, this how do you call it... it really hurts a lot, how can you youngsters keep doing this so often? Are you all masochistic?"

"A smile," Kotaro indifferently supplied while still sitting there sipping his tea. "So you've been taking notes from that Kafuka girl, haven't you?"

"Well," the depressed as ever teacher muttered, looking down at his sandaled feet, "I'm a perfectionist after all, if I had to perform here I wouldn't pick cues from anyone but the most fearsome creature I've ever met..."

* * *

 _Back at another dimension, timeline or whatever (The Nasuverse Is So Confusing!):_

"Basically, this is what we have managed to gather from preliminary observation of this singularity," Romani Archaman lectured, giving the chosen away team for this mission their briefing before being deployed. "In addition to observing magical signatures matching all seven standard Classes, we have detected signals from Servants not fitting any of the known Classes, plus one Shielder, one Ruler, and a partial signature of what might be the remains of an Avenger."

The girl with the over-sized table shield blinked, surprised by the news. "But how can that be, Sensei? I thought the Shielder Class only came to be because of Chaldea's research? How can it exist in a world we haven't reached before?"

"Well," Da Vinci smiled, taking over the explanation, "the prior developers of Chaldea seem to have followed basic patterns that should fit most alternate dimensions across the shared continuum. As for the new Classes we have found, they seem to fit previously theoretical Class containers experimentally labeled as Vigilante, Destroyer, Trickster, Temptress and Monster."

"Oooo, Trickster!" chuckled a lean, colorful figure of buffoonish appearance standing at the back of the crowd of Servants designated to stay at the base for the Singularity's duration, unless emergency backup was needed. "I like the sound of that one. If I'm ever killed, please summon me again as one, Master," he requested of Ritsuko with a wide, playful smile that, as usual, greatly upset her off.

"Please be quiet, Mephistopheles," Dr. Roman frowned before taking back the explanation. "Anyway, this world's Grail seems to have remained dormant longer than usual, despite our preliminary readings showing all local Servants have been active for at least a couple of weeks by now. This is bad, as Da Vinci's first scans seem to point out to massive contamination in the Grail."

"Just like in Fuyuki?" Ritsuka asked.

"Yes, Master, indeed," Leonardo picked up the infodump baton once more. "But while that Grail was unleashed in a violent, explosive way, this one's been building up as its War remains stalled or stalemated for some reason."

"But," Ritsuko understood, "that only means the fallout will be even bigger when the Grail is finally summoned, doesn't it?"

"Very perceptive, Ritsuko-kun!" Roman smiled. "Yes, a Grail can't remain dormant indefinitely, especially one that has been corrupted by an outside force and hence possesses a mind of its own. Even if its intelligence were vestigial, it would still try to absorb all available Servants to extend its influence. Our current theory is, given the abundance of Servants in that world, the Grail wishes to bide its time. The more Servants it gathers around itself, the more power it will be able to absorb later."

"Heh," chuckled the bulky figure in horned armor standing by Ritsuka's left. "So of course you'll be sending more Servants its way!"

"It can't be helped," Leonardo smiled in a truly Gioconda way, "if we don't act soon, the Grand Caster will move on to take that sector with a Demon Pillar, and given it's a densely populated area with some of the biggest and fullest Leylines I've ever sensed, losing it would be a massive blow to our schedule. It's not like you plan to be consumed either way, do you, Mordred?"

"Of course not, don't be ridiculous!" the armored being's voice boomed as they slammed the tip of their correupted but still beautiful, silver and red sword on the shiny floor of the platform, sending small tremors everywhere. "It'll soon find out the heir of Camelot is impossible to digest! So what are we waiting for, Master?" they demanded of Ritsuka. "Why aren't we there already? I can feel as if that world were calling to me as we speak!"

 _At the Festival grounds, Saber again shuddered in disgust. "Why won't this sensation fade away, no matter what..." she mumbled to herself._

"Well, now I'm interested," quietly said a taciturn mature man with tanned skin and white hair, most of his body concealed in form fitting black and red armor. "I wish to go after that Grail, too."

"Sorry, Assassin," the Doctor said, "but the field team for this Singularity has already been chosen. Ritsuka-kun, you will be the on-point Master this time..."

"Aw, geez," Ritsuko made a face.

"You're still grounded, Ritsuko-kun," Roman said sternly. "Thirty days or until there's none of that pancake left, whichever comes last."

"Are you trying to ruin my figure?" Ritsuko wailed. "It's 'INFINITE PANCAKE' for a reason, Sensei!"

"No excuses," was the merciless reply. "You let Medea-chan cook it, you have to finish it."

Her brother nodded at Roman. "I'll do my best, Sensei!"

Leonardo nodded, tapping on her e-notepad with a pen as the faces of several Servants showed in the large screens set around the chamber while she named them. "For support, Mashu, Karna, Kiyohime, Diarmuid, Anne and Mary, Fionn, Mordred, Teach, Tamamo-san, Beowulf, Scathach, Sasaki and Marie Antoinette will act as your designated Servants..."

"A most wonderful decision!" eagerly approved the beautiful, blue haired Kiyohime, bringing her hands together as her large eyes shone splendidly. "I couldn't ask for a better group of followers to cheer for my union with Anchin-sama while in an exotic location! Well, other than the bearded bum. Unless the intent is to drop him there, in that case I shall gladly do it for you, Professor."

"Hey, what kinda way of treating a fair playing crewmate is that?!" loudly protested the foul-smelling fellow with the thick, unruly black beard. "I was actually rooting for you and the Master, yanno!"

"W-Well," Mashu, the Shielder, uneasily said then, "as long as we're with Karna and Miss Scathach, all enemies we find should pose no actual threat, I suppose..."

From the sidelines, the Phantom of the Opera chose that moment to play a few loud chords of truly ominous, haunting music.

Mordred glared at the masked fiend and the gigantic organ he sat at. "Why do you keep bringing that huge stupid thing to Leyshift meetings anyway?"

The shapely, tall Lancer in the body hugging dark purple outfit, Scathach the Witch, smiled enigmatically at Shielder's words. "While I am flattered you would think so highly of me child, I hope we find adversaries up to the task of threatening our lives despite my and Karna's presence. Otherwise, what would be the point of that whole incursion?"

"Um, saving all of existence?" Ritsuka blandly pointed out.

The Phantom played the same despairing cue once again.

"Will you stop doing that before I force-feed you that organ, you melodramatic drama queen?!" Mordred threatened him.

Scathach almost chuckled softly while absently tugging some of her very long hair back. "I suppose there's always that, Master. But, even leaving that aside... I do feel like there's something calling me to that battlefield, regardless. For some reason, my heart can't help but feeling some measure of pleasing anticipation at the prospect of heading into this 'Mahora'."

 _At the Festival grounds, Lancer again shuddered in unusual dread. "Why won't this sensation fade away, no matter what...?" he mumbled to himself. Therefore, he was not watching where he was going and got stepped on by the animatronic T-rex._

* * *

 _Mahora:_

One Yamazaki Takashi, in a light summer ensemble of thin white shirt, short shorts and a Little Fauntleroy hat, and one Mihara Chiharu, in a simple dark blue one piece and sandals, stopped by a tank themed food stand from CLAMP Gakuen. It was, on closer inspection, literally a real tank they had brought in, around which they had set several small tables and a kitchenette. It wasn't unusual for visitors from other schools to set up stands at a Mahorafest as a way to further fund their clubs for the remainder of the school year. After all, it's what all the Mahora clubs did. Mind you, the Social Economics Club and the Merchants Guild Club all protested these stands by 'scab students' and had been trying for years to get them banned, but since the administration got the rent money either way, it had not yet borne fruit.

Mahora students often were curious about the meals and customs of other academies, so that tactic worked more often than not, and Chiharu was no exception. She really wished she could have studied at CLAMP, and you even could say she had always felt like a CLAMP character...

"Welcome!" happily greeted the pretty girl, only a few years older than the junior students, sitting behind the makeshift counter desk set by the tank. She had short brown hair, a slim and short build, and wore camouflage-printed shorts, bikini top, and a cap she had put on backwards. "I'm Akiyama Yukari, may I take your order?"

"Um, yeah, good morning," Chiharu gave her a quick nod. "What's on your menu, Sempai?"

"Well, there's egg and bacon," Yukari answered. "Uhh, egg, sausage, and bacon. Egg and spam. Egg, bacon and spam. Egg, bacon, sausage and spam."

"Okay, I got it," Chiharu flinched a little. "Spam, alright..."

"Of course!" the older girl said. "Spam is an important part of military food, or battle food. It's always to be found during military operations. Spam, bacon, sausage and spam!"

Chiharu sweatdropped. "It's not like we are in a military operation, though..."

"The spam, egg and spam combo is like luncheon meat!" Yukari explained. "Nutritious and delivious rations for energetic days like these! Spam, spam and baked beans, too!"

"Oh!" Yamazaki brightened. "You mean, like the luncheon meat in Okinawa cuisine, with bitter gourd and tofu? And there's luncheon meat sushi, too!"

Yukari nodded, laughing. "Luncheon meat sushi and eggs and spam!"

Several girls from the other divisions of the CLAMP Tankery Teams, who stood around taking orders and serving tables while in colorful bikinis (and in one case, wearing a full diving suit), quickly fell into a straight line and sing-sang, smiling widely, "Eggs and bacon and spam! Eggs and bacon and sausage and spam!"

Yamazaki brought his hands together, singing along. "Spam, spam, spam and spam! Or lobster Thermidor, aux crevettes with Mornay sauce!"

The bikini girls nodded and added, "Garnished with truffle pate, brandy, and a fried egg on top! And spam!"

"We aren't of legal age to drink!" Chiharu protested. "Have you got anything without spam in it?"

"Well, the spam, egg, sausage and spam special doesn't have much spam in it," Yukari offered.

"Why can't we have egg, bacon, spam and sausage?" Yamazaki asked Chiharu.

"Because that's got spam in it!" she replied. "Look, couldn't we have egg, bacon, spam and sausage without the spam?"

Yukari and her girls made a face. "Ewww...!"

"Whaddya mean by 'Ewww'?!" Chiharu cried. "I don't like spam!"

"Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam!" loudly sang a nearby large table of Viking cosplayers, raising their jars of root beer. With spam. "Spam! Spam! Spam!"

"Shut up! That's annoying!" Chiharu shouted.

 _"LOVELY SPAM! WONDERFUL SPAM!"_

Insert random brief footage of a sailing Viking ship in black and white here.

 _"LOVELY SPAM! WONDERFUL SPAM!"_

"Okay, everyone, that'll be enough!" Yukari said, slamming a huge spoon on her desk a few times to impose herself. "Miss, you can't have egg, bacon, spam and sausage without the spam! Then it wouldn't be egg, bacon, spam and sausage, would it?"

"Why not? I hate spam!" Chiharu screeched.

 _"LOVELY SPAM! WONDERFUL SPAM!"_

"Oh, don't make a fuss, Chiharu-chan," smiled Yamazaki. "I'll have your spam. I love it! I love spam, spam, spam, spam, spam! And baked beans!"

"Baked beans are forbidden!" Chiharu made an expression of disgust.

"Well, may I have some spam then?"

 _"LOVELY SPAM! WONDERFUL SPAM!"_

A red-haired, clearly foreign older boy walked in, wearing swimming trunks and an open jacket. He was carefully reading through an open booklet on Quick Learning Japanese, standing before Yukari and asking her with a stilted All-American accent, "Oh, hello great boobies, Honey Bun-chan-desu. My lower intestine is full of spam, egg, spam, bacon..."

Reizei Mako's head lazily peeked out of the tank. "We've just wasted valuable moments of your life making you read through a gratuitous Monty Python pastiche of a gratuitous Girls und Panzer pastiche of a Monty Python joke," she dryly told the audience. "We now implore for your forgiveness."

"Who are you even talking to?!" Chiharu screamed. "Stop the silliness! There's too much silliness!"

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"Okay, preparations complete!" Doctor Roman shouted. "Systems, all green! So, let's go! Just like usual, I'm relying on you guys! Leyshift, begin!"

That was, naturally, the exact second things chose to go pot.

"... okay, so much for all that hotblooded enthusiasm," Ritsuko calmly commented as all sorts of alarms began flaring and howling all over the chamber. "Maybe I should go on a diet after all, too much pancake can't be good for me…"

Mozart gasped. "Her Majesty! Someone do something for Her Majesty!"

Mephistopheles cocked his head aside quite unnaturally. "Oohhhh, does this mean more work for us from here on...?"

"Fou fou fou, fou kyu..." opined the small, adorable and white fluffy quadrupedal sitting on the floor next to Ritsuko's feet.

"No need for such foul language," Mephistopheles grinned.

"Everyone stay calm," Da Vinci instructed while frantically reading from one screen to another, fingers racing over one keyboard and then the next. "This is nothing but a minor access inconvenience, isn't that right, Doct-"

"AAGGH!" Roman took both hands to his head. "Trouble just like usual again!? This is bad! Just as usual! Why do we never learn?-! We're all the pinacle of heroism, learning and human experience, why do we all act like the crew of the Enterprise on a particularly moronically-written episode?"

"Where's all that optimism from five seconds ago now?!" Ritsuko protested.

"Shut up and eat your pancake!"

Nero quietly waved at the fox-tailed silhouette of Tamamo-No-Mae, frozen in place in the flash of the Leyshift, just like those of everyone else with her. "Goodbye forever, Goddess. You were, for all intents, the sole worthy rival for someone of my stature..."

"Good riddance, yeah, I can agree there," muttered the Lancer Elizabeth Bathory. She had never forgiven Tamamo for that time the fox had stuffed her in a maid outfit.

"Doctor, just react already!" Da Vinci urged. "This is no time for panic!"

"But rejoice!" Bathory added. "The stage is clear at last for the true star of this show!"

"I'm trying, I'm trying!" Roman said, getting to work while ignoring the young Countess' off-place remarks. "But these are no mere off-tracked readings! This is literally a black hole! There was a black hole just before the destination of the regular Leyshift! I can't shift the Leyshift track back by mere regulators!"

"C-Can they be brought back, or not?!" Ritsuko asked, grow quite worried now.

"No! But I think we can reroute them successfully!" Da Vinci said, adding pressure to the transdimensional jump. "Yes! That's it! Jump! Jump, Romani!"

"I'll bet that's what you tell him every night after work hours," the pink haired Queen Medb commented.

"It is, but that's none of your business!" Leonardo said, then addressed one of the remaining human operators after Professor Lev's massacre at the start of this ongoing crisis. "Opeko-chan, shoot an anchor, quickly! We need to at least get a grasp of their position! You've already shot it? NICE! Um...!"

"What... What's that 'um' supposed to mean?" Ritsuko frowned.

Da Vinci sighed as the signals went back to acceptable parameters. "The good news are they pulled through and the Leyshift was completed. Apparently, there was some sort of additional interdimensional incursion going on at the same time, which threw our own attempt off balance. The bad news is... well, the party's bio-magi signatures were detected as being scattered in opposite directions."

"So everyone just went flying their own ways and will land separate from each other, huh," Ritsuko summed up. "Again. Well, that's not too bad, it's standard protocol for most 'party of wacky heroes gets plunged into alternate world' tales. They'll get into trouble anyway, maybe it's better if they start a chain of small incidents rather than a single huge one. Heck, it's happened enough that we really should invest in better GPS and maybe walky-talkies for everyone."

Again, the Phantom of the Opera played the haunting foreboding music on his organ, louder than ever before.

Since her son (she was learning to support his non-cishet self-image, even if the terminology still made no fucking sense to her) wasn't around anymore to do the honors, the Santa Rider Artoria Pendragon Alter did her part for the family and wordlesly slammed her titanic bag of presents on the Phantom's head.

* * *

 _The road to Mahora. In more than one sense:_

"I told you guys we should've taken the train," the short-haired Fujimi Chihiro mumbled, fanning herself with a hand as the Nekomi Motor Club's van made its way along one of many side ways and byways leading towards the massive tree and academic complex in the distance.

"But, Chief!" loudly whined the mountain of a man behind the wheel, one Tamiya Toraichi, in a white muscle shirt and blue jeans. "We're Motor Enthusiasts Supreme, how cud we'd show up dere not drivin' our own wheels?!"

"Well, then I should've been the one driving, not you!" the much smaller young woman angrily snapped at him, making Tamiya and the not-that-shorter college student sitting at his side, the mohawk-sporting, leather clad Ootaki Hikozaemon, cringe in complete fear. "You've still got no sense of direction at all, Tamiya! It took you hours, bringing us to a place with THAT big a landmark!" she accused, pointing through the windshield and to the World Tree's mass, which was still mostly behind a hill.

"But, but I wuz the designated driver f'r dis week, remembuh..." the musclebound giant mousily apologized, almost shrinking under her glare. "Yuh had said yuh wanted ta take a break t'day, Boss...!"

Chihiro sighed, leaning back on her back seat, and rubbing her forehead with two fingers. "I know, I know, but if I'd known you'd do this bad a job at this, I'd have done it myself... Geez, let's just stop so I can take the wheel already, Megumi-chan must be eager to get there already..."

"Nah, I'm okay, don't bother," smiled the even younger junior student sitting at her right, happily stuffing her mouth with Pocky sticks while enjoying the view of the Mahora fields. She had short, chocolate brown hair and was wearing a lime green bikini under her open jacket and shorts. "'S alright, not like Keiichi will be waiting for my arrival with open arms..."

Tamiya narrowed his already small and beady eyes, squinting at the road ahead. "Wuzzat, a flash...?"

"Watch out, man," Ootaki reached over to tug on his shoulder, "I've heard 'bout junk like this punk robbers like to do. They blind drivers on the highway, get 'em to stop and then, blam! Bad shit! Whatever you do, don't- Stop, man! Stop, for the love of God!" he suddenly added, steam blowing out of his ears as his mouth grew positively huge.

Tamiya, those tiny dark eyes suddenly growing as wide as they'd ever get, nodded eagerly. "No need ta tell me, man! Dat ass' worth any risks...!"

Chihiro frowned as she leaned ahead to look over their broad shoulders. "What? What's that, you idiots? As your Club President, I've got to know... Oh, wow." She smiled all of a sudden. "How cute...!"

"Something that's both sexy and cute?" Morisato Megumi asked, curious, finally bothering to take a look as well while the vehicle screeched to a halt. "Don't tell me Net Idol Chiu's doing hitchhiking now... Oh, whoa, nice," she ended up smiling.

Two mismatched figures were rising from the pavement and dusting themselves off, attracting the attentions of all four people in the van. One of them was a tall, buxom and long legged blonde beauty, clearly a foreigner, in skimpy red and black pirate cosplay, her large round breasts almost popping out of her wide cleavage. The other was much shorter, a pale, silver haired little girl in a very concealing, mostly black with some red along the sleeves, outfit that, thanks to her collar, even hid the lower half of her face.

They looked at their surroundings, then at the van and the people coming out of it, and then at each other.

"Well," the shorter of the duo said, "the Doc's done it again."

"No doubt about that," the tall woman nodded. "I just hope Master's okay. Should we steal their car, Mary?"

The little girl pondered it as the big men whose expressions were already reminding her of Blackbeard's approached them quickly. Her wish to just gut them on general principle for reminding her of Blackbeard won at first, but then was swiftly overruled by another concern. "No," she quietly shook her head. "I guess Master wouldn't like that..."

"Huh, the sooner he embraces the lifestyle, the better," the blonde said, putting on a friendly smile while waving at the newcomers. "Hello!" she greeted them. "Good to see you, I think we're lost! We're looking for a boy-!"

"Well, this your lucky day then, Ma'am!" grinned Tamiya, swiftly walking past the annoyed Mary as if she were invisible, and almost getting himself on her partner's face, much to her subdued annoyance. "You won't find no boy here, but a man, an' what a man, an' dat's much better...!"

"TA-MI-YA!" Chihiro growled, reaching over to grab him by an ear and easily pull his rock hard body back, her other arm already doing the same with the barely any less eager Ootaki. "Be a gentleman, will you?! And you, Hikozaemon, you've got a girlfriend back at home, remember?!"

"I'm just being friendly, dat's all, Chief!" Ootaki protested while Megumi chuckled, standing slightly behind.

Chihiro pushed them back, smiling before reaching down to pat Mary's head. "Please excuse Tamiya and Ootaki, they're both brain-damaged. You got lost on your way to Mahora, huh? Going to score some wicked prizes at those contests, no doubt!"

"Yes. We are always going for the big wicked score," Mary nodded. "I'm Mary, and this is my mate Anne. Where are you going?"

"Well, to Mahora, of course!" Chihiro said. "We're going to visit two friends who moved there recently. One of them is the brother to Megumi-chan here," she gestured towards the Morisato girl, who smiled at the two girls and waved at them. Once again, Ann waved at her as well. "But, what happened to your ride? Why are you all alone at the middle of nowhere?"

"You could say we were kicked out of our ride here," Anne supplied. "We've got some very incompetent and downright unfriendly crew mates, I guess!"

"Huh, yeah, I know the feeling, Sis," Chihiro nodded. "Well, no prob, then! We can't possibly leave a cute little girl and her big sister all alone on the highway, so why don'tcha come with us? There's still a lotta room in the van!"

"Oh, that's so kind from you," Anne politely enough nodded while Mary said or did nothing. "Good to see those roads aren't filled only with hijackers and thieves, but also with trustworthy nice people!"

After all, competition was bad, but an abundance of suckers was always a good thing.

And so the Servant(s) Rider, Anne Bonny and Mary Read, found their ride to Mahora Academy in this strange new world. But, what about...?

* * *

"There's not much to steal here," estimated Edward Teach, the Rider Blackbeard, lazily scratching his cheek.

After appearing in a bang of light in the middle of a huge sealed chamber that actually was quite reminiscent of several of Chaldea's rooms, they had snooped around quickly only to realize there was nothing there but the many lines and lines of mechanical men stashed along the shiny walls, all of them standing perfectly straight with complete non-expressions on their faces.

"No, seriously? Thanks for telling me, I'd never have noticed otherwise," huffed Kiyohime, all of her graceful, ladylike charm completely gone while alone with the unpleasant male Servant. She eyed the whole lineup of artificial men, standing in silence like mannequins, suspiciously, finding them to be almost as repulsive, such a far cry from her Anchin-sama's appeal. They all were identically tall and muscular, dressed in black shirts and pants, with their eyes covered by shades, and their synthetic hair kept stylized spiked and blond. "What kind of homunculi are these anyway? Part of a plan from Solomon's forces, perhaps?"

"Who knows?" Rider shrugged, reaching into the pockets of one of the metal men and failing to find anything inside. "Damn, not even a miserable coin! This place's a bust, let's just get out and look for the Master..."

"Finally, you speak with some sense," Kiyohime said, nervously covering her small mouth with a demure fan. "I'm so worried about Anchin-sama, if he were okay, he'd have summoned me to his side already...!"

"Eh, odds are he's just unconscious, you know he gets knocked out every time a breeze hits him the wrong way," the pirate said. "We'd be disappearing right now if he were dead, wouldn't we? So why don't we just-"

Finally, the alarms of the chambers picked up on the presence of transdimensional Servants (and in Chao's defense it must be said she'd never had the chance to perform detailed studies on Servants before. She was a mage after all, not a magus!) and began blaring in earnest, bathing the whole room in red and blue lights as a Chinese accented voice kept on shouting "ARELT! INTLUDELS! ARELT! INTLUDELS! ARELT!"

"EEEEEEEE!" Kiyohime shrieked.

"Well, shit!" Blackbeard cursed, pulling his ancient, rusty flintlocks out. "Get ready, Princess! The heat of battle is upon us again! Come forth, scurvy dogs! The King of Pirates waits for your deaths with open arms!"

One of the robots, the one right before Blackbeard, moved at last, seeming to look down at him, for while Teach was tall, the artificial man was even bigger and more imposing in appearance. "Well?" Teach challenged, gesturing with his guns. "At least you moved unlike your brothers, boy, but aren't you doing anything beyond that? Come on, you sissy! Give me something before I send you to your-"

The robot opened his unusually wide mouth, shot a massive blast out of it, and vaporized all of the clothes off Blackbeard while Kiyohime screamed again.

Teach blinked, looked down at himself for a moment, and then only scoffed at the robot. "So what? Do you think having my sausage exposed Is gonna even slow me down, son? Thank you, it was kinda hot in here anyway! Now what if you stop being so-"

Much to his surprise, he was not further attacked from the front but from behind, as the Berserker bashed him on the head with her fan, which cracked with a deafening toll as Blackbeard's eyes bugged out. "COVER YOURSELF, DAMN YOU! MY EYES ARE FOR ANCHIN-SAMA'S NUDITY ONLY! AH! MY MAD ENHANCEMENT IS RISING! IT'S RISING!"

"Owie owie owie, boo-hoo...!" the pirate sobbed, collapsing to his knees while holding his bleeding scalp. As he did, he rematerialized his clothes around his body, Kiyohime still seething furiously. "You gotta some real bad set of priorities, Princess! Well, never mind," he regained his crooked grin, leaping back to his feet to train both guns on the scowling mockup man. "Time to send this piece of scrap to the junkyard! Maybe Edison will pay something for him, heh heh..."

"Units 002 to 137, activate," the Chinese voice said then, as several other robots, dozens of them, stirred to life as well, surrounding the two Servants from all directions threateningly. "Units 002 to 137, activate, you are to contain the enemy until the Master's arrival..."

Kiyohime sweated nervously as the robots began all opening their mouths, aiming them at the duo. "Oh dear, oh dear, oh no, this can't possibly be..."

"Feh!" Blackbeard spat. "Do your worst, nancy-men! Do you think we're any scared of your little silly trick..."

"KYAAAAAA!" Kiyohime screamed as several dozens of stripping beams converged on them from every side. "MAD ENHANCEMENT!"

A few moments later, the chamber's door was blown from the inside, and off ran the naked Kiyohime, doing her best to shield her privates with a hand as the other dragged the just as nude Blackbeard along by the shaggy hair, as if he weighed nothing. "C'mon, let's be reasonable here, Lady!" the pirate shouted, still shooting at the army pursuing them down the long corridors he was being pulled into. "We're Servants, mankind's best and strongest! If we just stay and fight, in no time we'll be done with them and you'll just dress up agai-"

"No, no, no, anything but this!" Kiyohime wailed while leading the frantic escape. "I can take any other sort of enemy, I don't mind being killed in battle for Anchin-sama, but I won't be disgraced like this anymore...! Anchin-sama, please please forgive me...! Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama…!"

* * *

In another chamber, several stories higher and closer to the surface, Soryu Asuka Langley snapped as soon as she heard the news. "You're saying who's WHERE?!"

Horaki Hikari, who currently was dressed as a bridge bunny for some sort of secretive military organization that employed unethical child labor flinched as she pointed at her screen, which was showing live footage from the events currently transpiring below. "Um, I'm not sure myself, Asuka, but the fact is, there's SOMEONE in there... How they broke through all of the defenses, I have no idea, but they're on the run from the Tanaka Squad..."

"A hobo and some whore in cosplay?!" Asuka gasped, staring at the images while Suzuhara Touji and Aida Kensuke also leaned closer to get a view. "Damn, how could this happen, Chao told me this place was virtually unbreakable! Okay, Hikari, start the lockdown and call on Chao! These bastards might have slipped under our noses, but they won't escape alive..."

Right then, however, they simply blinked out of sight.

"... they went invisible?" Asuka's eyes became diminutive.

"We aren't getting any heat or heartbeat readings from them either," Hikari said, taking further lectures from the security controls. She had been a very quick student and had gotten the grasp of the system shortly after Asuka started educating her on them. "I think they just, I don't know..."

"They teleported away?!" Kensuke excitedly smiled, his glasses glinting. "Alright, that's the coolest! There's not a boring day here, guys, this place's just the greatest!"

"You idiot, don't act so thrilled!" Asuka yelled at him. "Don't you realize this is a serious matter? We've just had a major security breach here! And right at the worst moment, too!"

Touji sighed. "The biggest mystery here is, you know, what a guy like that was doing with a babe that hot? Does he have her kidnapped or sumthin'?"

"It looked the other way around instead, if you ask me," Kensuke offered.

"No one did," Asuka grouched, then looked back and forth between the confused Hikari and the pondering Touji, in a bitterly sulking way. "And some girls just have tastes that crappy, after all..."

* * *

"Where are we, I wonder?" Sasaki Kojiro, the elegant Assassin from the East and legendary savior of France wondered aloud as he and the petite and adorable Marie Antoinette, the All French Rider, walked around the large, quiet house they had materialized at.

"I don't know, but it's certainly a very comfortable home," the short-female who looked like she was wearing a wedding cake smiled, eyeing each room they passed with heartfelt warmth. "It's a place where you can feel the love between its inhabitants, the unmistakable bonds of family..."

"And it's also a traditional Japanese home," Kojiro approved, taking a glance of a training hall, with even a pair of boken hanging from a wall. "I like its atmosphere, and it must mean we haven't strayed too much from the path intended for us. Da Vinci-dono mentioned this 'Mahora' was a Japanese city, although I don't remember it from my time..."

"Oh! _Monsieur_ , look!" Marie said, stopping by a framed picture of a man posing before the house with a small, red-haired, mostly inexpressive boy. "Doesn't this gentleman remind you of someone?"

Assassin looked at the picture carefully before providing his answer. "He strikes a fair resemblance to the Assassin from Fuyuki, indeed. Do you believe, Your Majesty...?"

"Well, it could be said there are no coincidences, and Madame Leonardo said this Mahora was close to Fuyuki City," the Queen reasoned. "Who can say which path Assassin's life took in this world? Oh!" Seeing a shelf with a few books just past another door, she quickly ran there, selected one of them, eagerly read through it, and finally put it down with a small sigh. "Then again, some things remain constant, apparently. _C'est la vie_."

Assassin took a discreet look at the tome, which was one on World History (which Shirou had brought in desperation in an attempt to decode the increasingly trollish hints about Saber's identity), and guessed Rider had just looked up information about her own self from this world. "It can't be helped, Your Majesty," he politely told her, looking out through a window, and seeing the lively campus in the distance. "Please don't distract yourself with such thoughts and let us search for the Master and the rest instead. If I had to guess, I would say there are some festivities happening across this city as we speak. In that environment, most of our companions are sure to stand out, so finding them should be no difficult task..."

Marie took a look as well, her face brightening with another smile. "Oh, how perfectly lovable! A Carnival! It's been such a long time. If only all Singularities could be as pleasant as this...!"

Kojiro, being a highly respectful man for the most part, restrained himself from pointing out that would have earned a fitting ominous cue from the Phantom right then and there...

* * *

Somewhere else, Diarmuid, as per standard procedure, put a bag over his head., looking out through two crudely made eyeholes. His body was still covered by lipstick marks from women he'd barely escaped, and all things considered he looked ridiculous, but after seeing someone walk by wearing armor made of cardboard boxes with the ensign 'Gundam' written on the front, he felt he would likely fit right in.

Really, the women of this Singularity! Had they no shame? Surely he was the most unfortunate person here, for his cursed love-mark to cause him such terrible suffering in this place!

 _Meanwhile, Negi sneezed._

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"The legend of La Llorona, or 'The Crying Woman'," Sakurako explained as she led them into the next room, Negi rubbing his nose and Abiru re-adjusting her bikini top on, "is one well spread among almost all Latin American countries, from Mexico to Argentina (except for the Philippines, where it never really caught on). It has a lot of variants from one country from another, but generally, it tells the story of a woman of native heritage who, after being abandoned by her usually Spanish lover, took the lives of their own children in an attempt to take revenge. Afterwards, she was cursed to roam the fields and plains constantly calling for her lost children."

"Wow," Harumi said. "She really didn't get how revenged worked, did it? What kind of cray woman thinks killing your own kids will be a good revenge on your no-good ditching husband?"

 _Somewhere in Mahora, Medea sneezed._

 _"¿Donde? ¿Donde estaran mis hijos...?"_ moaned a haunting voice from the darkness of the room.

"See? That's Spanish for 'Where? Where are my children?'" Sakurako said. "La Llorona usually appears before carefree men hanging out in the open and parting ways from their families, seducing them into coming with them, before revealing herself as a hideous specter shouting for her lost children..."

"And memory problems too," Harumi tsked. "Is there any mention of how drunk she was when she made this plan? Because her being a violent drunk would actually explain a lot…"

Two strong arms reached out of the shadows and firmly took hold of Negi, pulling him towards the tall, eerie figure of Roberta Cisneros, Ayaka's closest and strongest maid, clad in a long white robe, her long black hair loose and her face completely caked in thick, chalk white greasepaint. _"¿Dooooonde estaraaaaaaaaan mis hiiiiijoooooooos?!"_

"Wheeeere aaaaaaare my chiiiiiildreeeeeeeen?!" Sakurako translated again, all business-like, while Roberta held the blinking Negi against herself, his head tightly nested between her substantial, robust breasts.

"¿... Se me antoja una galleta?" Negi meekly said, before Roberta let him go and the party kept on marching, Harumi, Kotaro and Abiru not even flinching as Sakurako ushered them towards the next room.

"Now, in the next blood curling display, we will face the Jersey Devil itself, who definitely is not one of my cats in an elaborate devil costume, nya..."

"Who was that woman, by the way?" Harumi asked Shiina as they left the room behind.

"Oh, one of Iinchou's maids who graciously agreed to help us, that's all..." Negi explained.

"No, Sensei, you're doing it all wrong, you're breaking the illusion!" the cheerleader protested. "That's La Llorona herself, directly from the depths of El Infierno, nya! I mean, miau!"

"She's not very scary one way or another..." Abiru commented.

"Oh, try saying anything bad about Iinchou in her presence and you'll know true terror at its worst, trust me..." Chisame said.

Roberta huffed to herself while they disappeared deeper into the house, then flicked a hand, a small handgun popping out of her sleeve and aiming at a certain patch of darkness. "What are you doing here?" she curtly asked.

The rough, manly voice answered immediately, even though the man himself had not stepped into sight yet. "That's only a .22. It won't do anything against my body armor."

"It's been improved upon by the Zaibatsu. It would shock you to learn how many layers it can shoot through now," Roberta icily said. "Now don't give me any reasons to teach you and tell me, why are you snooping around them now?"

"They might be in danger," the Batman's voice said.

"From whom?" Roberta growled.

"The Joker's still on the loose, last time he was seen with Sakurazaki's sworn nemesis, and this festival offers exactly the kind of venue he would crave above all others," the Bat explained. "What else do you need?"

Roberta's scowl only grew. "What makes you so sure he'll come here? It'd be like walking into a huge trap. Nobody can hope to wander here, harm the students and teachers, and leave alive. Even Amagasaki had to wait until Konoe left the school's perimeter."

"The Joker is both good enough at what he does to have a chance at it... and crazy enough to not care if he can't succeed," the grave voice warned. "Either way, would you gamble your charge's life on that?"

"Never," Roberta's reply came with no hesitation. "But why would he come here instead of going back to your city? It's you he's obsessed with."

"I don't know," he admitted, "but it's been almost a full month now and he hasn't returned to Gotham yet. Joker's anything but patient, if he wanted to aim for a rematch with me, he'd have gone back already. Whatever brought him to Japan in the first place, he's still wrapped up in it, and odds are it involves Professor Springfield, Rosario."

"Never call me that," she sneered, still not lowering the small gun. "And honestly, that boy... when will he stop bringing problems to La Señorita? You came alone?"

"As a matter of fact... no, this time, I didn't."

"You didn't bring the masked dog this time around, did you?"

"No."

"The obnoxious floating midget, then?"

"I told you then, he isn't with me, I don't control when he comes and goes... but I really hope he skips this one, last thing we need at all is his presence here..."

" _Please_ tell me you didn't bring your son!"

"He's not my son. Why does everyone keep assuming he's my son? It's weird."

"It would be weirder if he wasn't your son."

* * *

 _Meanwhile, in the 'Jersey Devil' exhibit:_

"Come on Blair, let me be the Jersey Devil this time!" a busty cat-woman (not catgirl. Definitely not a catgirl) whined at one of her compatriots.

"Nope, it's still my turn," Blair said, sitting in place and smirking.

"Damn it! I'm the actress here, I'd be better at this than you!"

"You pretended to be a dog. That's not acting, that''s getting drunk."

"Yoruichi!" Felicia whined. "Make her switch with me!"

Yoruichi looked up from her copy of 'Shapeshifting Cat-Women Monthly'. "Leave me out of this, I just operate the special effects for this room."

* * *

"Be my briiiiiiide! Be my bride, will you, nyaaaaaa!" the gigantic, overly amorous, fat cat that floated in the middle of the next room eagerly requested, trying to wrap a large paw around Sakurako's waist while attempting to force a golden bell on a collar on her neck at the same time. "My sweet little kitten...!"

"... basically, this is something Haruna brought from her old neighborhood in Nerima," Chisame dryly explained while Satomi and Negi bravely tried their best to pry the ectoplasmatic, obese feline away from the shrieking, punching and kicking cheerleader.

"Huh," Harumi huffed, with her arms folded. "Funny, she never told me they had any makers of hyper-realistic holograms there. The way she describes it, it's always sounded to me like that place's eternally stuck in the eighties, and possibly from a Mad Max movie set in China..."

Kotaro muttered something, turned away from the situation with his arms crossed behind his neck, twitching uneasily. The combined impulses of leaping over to save a girl and leaping over to attack a big cat were overwhelming indeed, but he'd promised his mother he wouldn't reveal himself unless absolutely necessary, and there was no impulse that was greater to him than a promise to that woman.

The threat of the Maomolin wasn't finished until Abiru sneaked behind him and somehow managed to take a firm hold on his long white tail to start tugging on it mercilessly, much to her pleasure.

It was there he would learn at last that yes, there were heights of insanity that were even greater than those found in Nerima, and that it's not always good when a pretty girl shows an intense interest in you...

* * *

"Geez, this planet sure is hot," Nana complained while fanning herself with one hand as she, Momo, Lala, Rito and Mikan walked through the Commercial District of the Festival. Nana wore a functional blue one piece, while Momo was clad in a bikini that mostly seemed made of elaborate frills strung together around her breasts, crotch and hips. Lala was in a very daring dark green bikini, Mikan in the same summer clothes she had been wearing for breakfast, and Rito in blue swimming trunks and old, worn down sneakers. The kind you don't mind if they're gone in a clothes destroying accident, you know.

"And now you see why I always walk around naked," Lala nodded sagely, making quite a few heads in the passing crowds turn around so quickly you could almost hear their necks snapping.

"That's no excuse, you always did that at home too," Nana muttered. In all truth, public nudity was not a huge taboo in Deviluke, but Nana was kind of a prude by her species' standards. "Is it like this all year long here?"

"No, the winter months are a bit colder. The weather used to be overall gentler before the Second Impact from what Dad's told us," Mikan said, occasionally taking longing looks at the items on display for sale, then discouraging Rito with a hand gesture as soon as he looked at them as well. "But, Nana-san, isn't your, ah, country far harsher in temperature than Japan? From what Lala told us, I thought it had a very rough climate..."

Momo giggled coquettishly. "Oh, Lala gets overheated too easily, that's all! Again, that's why she always prefers wearing as little as possible!"

"I have cooling functions attached," Peke sighed from where she sat on Lala's head, keeping her quirky voice low enough she wouldn't call out too much attention from the bystanders, "but Lala-sama usually says they don't feel right..."

"You either overdo it or don't do enough, Peke, sorry," Lala sighed, absently tugging on the shoulder straps of her top. "Ritoooooo, why don't we stop by to get a drink or twooooo? I would like that...!"

"Um, sure, why not?" Rito asked, reaching for the wallet in one of the pockets Mikan had sewn into his trunks. "I'm a bit thirsty too, I'll pay for everyone..."

"Well, then I'll ask for three drinks for myself!" Nana smirked, showing her sharp little fangs out.

Momo laughed at her. "That's good, as long as you ask for ice cold milkshakes! You still need a lot of milk in your daily diet, Nana!"

Nana's eyebrows twitched as she watched her twin's breasts bounce ever so slightly with her laugh. "Sometimes you're just the worst, Momo..."

"Now, now, it's a happy pleasant day, keep it that way, will you?" Rito asked as they moved towards a small food and drink stall, blinking when realizing there were others there he recognized. "Oh, good morning... Nagase-san, right? And you're also Haruna-chan's classmates, huh..."

"Oh, Yuuki-dono, how are you. Lala-hime-sama, Mikan-dono, too," Nagase Kaede, in a black one piece with a deep low cleavage cut, detached collar, necktie and detached cuffs, turned her head to look at them with her always closed eyes. "Look, Fumika-dono, Fuuka-dono, it's Haruna-dono's honorable boyfriend!"

Two nearly identical pink topped heads, different only because of their hairstyles, rose from the ice-cream cones they had been feasting on.

"Oh!" the one with small buns on her head said. "Good morning, everyone!"

"Lala-sempai!" the one with short twintails waved happily. "Come on, come on, sit around here, there are still a few... Oh," she stopped, her gaze and Fumika's meeting those of Nana and Momo. "Why, he-llooooo, I don't think we've been introduced...?"

"What? There are more of them?" asked another voice, making Rito take a look at the boy sitting at Kaede's other side, opposite the Narutaki twins. He was on the tall side, blond and with blue eyes, his torso bare and his lower half in Bermuda shorts, feet bare. On each cheek he had some strange markings that looked like animal whiskers, or perhaps symmetrical scratches. His obnoxious tone had Rito pegging him as an American tourist at first.

"Naruto," came the short, tense preemptive warning on a pink haired girl in a dark red bikini sitting next to the shy-looking, blue-haired pale beauty in a purple one piece and open jacket sitting by the older boy's other side. "Don't say it like that, as if there were anything wrong with that!" She then smiled for Rito's party. "How do you do, I'm Haruno Sakura, a sempai of Kaede-chan from her old school! And these are Hyuga Hinata-chan and Uzumaki Naruto, we've come to visit her during the Festival. So, Haruna-san's boyfriend, huh? Kaede-chan's told us a lot about Haruna-san!"

Then, keeping the same friendly smile, she made her stool hop back a few steps away from Rito, since she also had been warned about HIM. Her anger management sessions were going fine, so she didn't want to risk a new incident of having to punch some unfortunate clumsy soul into the stratosphere.

Rito nodded as he walked several steps back in the opposite direction, for pretty much the same reasons but from the other side. "Oh, that... that's great, Haruno-san. Then, um, I'm Yuki Rito, this is my sister Mikan, this is my, our, ah, classmate Lala, and they are her sisters, Momo-chan and Nana-chan..."

"Such lovely names...!" Fuuka said with a bright smile, intertwining her fingers while Fumika gave her a small suspicious look. Then Fuuka tilted her head towards Sakura. "Do you have a twin sister as well, Sempai?"

"Having pink hair doesn't equal having a twin!" Sakura snapped, those sessions' worth already chipping away.

"I think I like you already!" Momo told Fuuka with another mischievous giggle.

For a moment, Fumika and Nana's eyes met, sharing a long-suffering look about how frustrating trollish twin sisters were and how it almost didn't seem worth it to keep sleeping with them. Almost.

Thus was a mutual dependent sanity-preserving friendship formed.

* * *

 _Haunted House:_

The next room was filled with all sorts of small, disturbing living shadows, creeping around each corner, dropping from the ceiling, squirming across the floor. They were misshapen and twisted, and although not much of them could be seen in the darkness, it was at least clear most of them were armed with claws and sported several mouths lined up with rows and rows of sharp teeth that were highly uneven in size and colors. They had quickly surrounded the youngsters from every side, chuckling and sneering and staring at them with their crimson sharply shaped eyes.

"C-Congratulations, Sakurako-san, Satomi-san!" Negi uneasily smiled, feeling a strange sense of deja vu and strangely thinking that the eyes should have been yellow. "This has to be the most realistic display yet..."

"Y-You don't understand, Negi-sensei!" Shiina gasped. "There wasn't supposed to be anything like this here, it was meant to only be a breather room with no attractions! Nya!"

"I certainly didn't work on any of this..." Satomi calmly observed. "Chisame?"

"Don't look at me!" Chisame replied. "This is too... disgusting for my tastes!"

"A-ha-ha, yeah, well played, guys, acting as if this was a surprise to you to..." Harumi uneasily said, kicking an imp too close to her for comfort, "B-But seriously, cut it out already, you aren't fooling anyone, right, Abiru-chan...?"

"I'm scared out of my mind," confessed the Ghost Cat, who was still being tightly held by the tail by Abiru, as if he were some sort of huge festive balloon.

Kotaro hissed, unsheating his claws at hip level, where the girls couldn't see them yet. There was no way to fool his eyes or nose, these were real live shadow demons, but who had brought them here, and why...?

Right then, something else rose, gracefully, from the dark, and Negi readied his staff, while Chisame and Satomi reached for their Pactio cards and Kotaro prepared himself to lunge ahead. But he stopped himself when he saw the newcomer was a young woman with dark skin and white hair, wearing a flashy yellow bikini, with a jester's hat and pointy, curling elf shoes. She only bowed to Negi, and formally said, "Sensei. I hope you are having fun."

"Holy shit!" Matoi cried. "She can talk?"

"Yes, always," Zazie said.

"Z-Zazie-san?!" Negi gasped.

"Rainyday?!" Chisame yelped. "What the hell were you doing here?!"

"I forgot to give you these," Zazie said quietly, handing Negi two tickets. "For our Nightmare Circus tonight. Don't mind about paying for them. A gift from me. Bye. Be there."

"Ah... thank you?" Negi blinked, his eyes reduced to dots.

Zazie made a small smile at him, nodded, and then skillfully cartwheeled her way out of the room on her hands like a master acrobat, the shadow creatures hastily rushing out after them until there was not a single one of them left.

"..." Negi, Kotaro, Chisame, Satomi and Sakurako said.

Harumi stifled a laugh. "See?! I knew it, you 3-A are so predictable! Well, that was fun anyway, what's next...?"

"Can I go now?" the Maomolin asked hopefully.

"No," Abiru firmly said, tugging on the tail and making him meow loudly.

"... Rainyday smiling!" Chisame stuttered, tucking the card back in with trembling fingers. "Now THAT was freaky scary!"

"More than Itoshiki-sensei doing it, Chisame-sama?" Matoi asked her.

"Well, no, but what a close second...!"

* * *

Sitting by a large fountain along with a large group of girls, Tate Yuuchi looked at his wristwatch and wondered aloud, "I thought English people never were tardy?"

It wasn't that he disliked the company, far from it. Shiho, currently in a bright yellow one-piece with a frilly short skirt, was annoyingly clingy to his arm as usual, but he'd grown used to that over the years. And of course, being with her new circle of friends was a visual treat, especially the leggy blonde in the orange bikini and sarong, and the stunning tall black-haired beauty in the royal blue bathing suit that almost looked like a competition one. It was difficult to believe she was from Class 3-A, since she behaved with so much elegance and politeness.

Her pink haired smaller friend was almost as annoying as Shiho, though. "Oi, English people are also often too wrapped into very important things, Sempai! Cut them a break, will you!" Makie said reproachfully.

Tate gave the girl in the pink bathing suit that looked suspiciously like a gymnastics leotard a bored look. Too small and child-bodied for his liking, if only Mana-san were there... "I think you only know a single English person, right? How can you tell?"

"Actually, I know two," Makie said proudly. "Well, technically I know the same person twice, but it still counts!"

The orange haired Shirley Fenette, Akira's friend from the swim team and the one who had invited Akira over in the first place, tried to impose peace with a soft laugh and an airy wave of a hand. "It's okay, it's okay, we can be just as early or tardy as anyone else, right, Minako-san?"

Aino Minako blinked as she stopped petting the white cat sitting on her lap. "Uh, why are you asking me that, Sempai?"

"Well, Akira-chan told me you lived two full years in England, that makes you an honorary countryman, right?" the older swimmer and exchange student beamed her a smile.

Minako smiled and awkwardly rubbed the back of her own head. "Well, gee, I never had thought of it that way! I'm honored, but I don't know if I'd count as the perfect embodiment of the British spirit... never really got Monty Python…"

"None of us do," Akira confirmed.

"You don't look or sound the part at all, no," grumpily commented a very lost foreigner in all-concealing armor, passing by them while looking for their comrades.

"Bleh, who asked you!" Minako stuck her tongue out at the rude passerby as they disappeared into the crowd, bitterly mumbling to themselves. Artemis, for some reason, had grown very agitated at that sight, waving his tail around nervously. "Must be from Honnouji, being crazy enough as to wear that with this weather..."

Shirley tried to gently disagree on the whole Honnouji prejudice thing when her cellphone rang, and she quickly picked it up. "Hello? Ah, it's you, Milly! Yeah... By the SOS Brigade's stand? Y-Yeah, you're close enough now, just take a turn to the right and then walk all the way straight until you see us... Uh, uh, glad you survived that, then... N-No, they aren't all that bad here... Huh, you liked them? Ah, right, of course it would be Kallen who- Okay. Fine. See you then, you're almost here!"

Akira and the band of curious onlookers who had tagged along as soon as they heard Akira was going to greet visitors from Ashford of all places were by now leaning close enough Shirley only needed to half-turn around to be able to tell them right to their faces, "My friends are about to arrive, so you won't have to wait any longer! Just, just remember what I told you, please?"

Tate nodded. "Never ask the skinnier guy about his family."

Shiho nodded. "Never look the meidos in the eyes."

Minako nodded. "Never invade the redhead's personal space."

Akira nodded. "Polite but firmly set limits as soon as the blonde invades your personal space."

Makie nodded. "Step away from the meganeko as soon as she gets her hands on anything mechanical. That one's easy, it's our daily rule to coexist with Hakase-chan!"

"Riiiiight!" Shirley brought her hands together, her smile widening. Finally, her role was going to have some payoff after that guest appearance so many chapters ago! "Do all of that and you should be fine! Oh!" she perked up, springing to her feet while waving very high, gesturing towards a small group of people coming through the crowd, all of them stuck with SOS Brigade hats, the two boys even keeping SOS fliers in hand much to their quiet dismay. "There you are, there you are, come on, we are here...!"

Minako bit on her lower lip, her smile becoming downright kittenish. "I can't believe it, I'm going to actually meet Ashford students now! That's what I always dreamed of while living at London!"

"Yii-ppeeee," Tate sighed, so clearly not interested at all. "Just what I like the best, having to spend time with people we share nothing in com- Oh, oh, oh!" he quietly finished while Shiho frowned fiercely and tightened her possessive glomp on his arm.

Shirley had just skipped ahead to give a big hug to an exotic, dark-skinned and light-haired woman in high heeled shoes, an open safari jacket, and what had to be the most scandalous white bikini Tate had ever seen on anyone (he had not yet run into Shirai Kuroko in swimwear, the poor fool). And his mouth hung open, as Shirley went quickly from one member of the newcomers to the next, hugging them in succession, lingering more on the shorter and skinnier boy and having the busty blonde bombshell in the scarlet bikini linger on _her_ far more, in turn. "Professor Villeta! Lulu! Nunally-chan, I mean, Li'l Nunally! Milly! Kallen! Suzaku-kun! Nina-chan! Nice ring, is it new?" And then, finally, Shirley respectfully pulled back to simply bow at the two pale women with white hair pushing the wheelchair of the adorably frail looking little girl, instead of daring to hug them as well. "Miss Sella, Miss Leysritt, it's my pleasure to see you again. Um, well, nice to see everyone could come, please meet..."

She spun around grandly and gestured to introduce the Mahora contingent who just sat there not knowing exactly what to do next, other than Minako who simply swooned with stars and hearts in her eyes. "... my friends at Mahora Academy!" A paused. "Well, my friend Akira-chan at Mahora Academy! And her friends! And one of her friends' Oniichan! But I'm sure we'll all be good friends too, all the same!"

"What happened to the kingdom, a true disgrace indeed," the figure in the armor sourly commented as they walked past again, following the exact opposite direction from before but now holding a huge stick of cotton candy and a caramel apple. "This wouldn't have come to pass if only Father-"

Minako, greatly upset at this random asshole by now, simply picked up pebble and tossed it at the back of their head, where it bounced off with a loud metallic clang. She'd really wanted to look good in front of the Ashford students she idolized so much, especially the two hunks, but principles always came first, after all! Besides, she was defending their honor, maybe that would score her brownie points with them...

Mordred stopped abruptly as she felt the tiny thing hit the back of her helmet, not even beginning to dent it at all in the smallest microscopic fraction, and of course, immediately saw red over this unforgivable, terribly meaningful serious offense.

Perhaps now it would be as good a time as any other to skip to another group of characters for the time being?

Oh, the chapter's already over, you say? That's even better!

* * *

 **To be Continued!**


	3. Time Doesn't Pay

Wide-eyed and greatly impressed despite themselves, Negi and his companions stood in the middle of a gigantic chamber surrounded by dozens of flaming pits, in what Chisame was sure had to be a blatant violation to most of Mahora's safety laws, several notions of common sense, and various laws of physics like convection and thermodynamics. The air was unbearably hot and heavy, almost unbreathable, and as a matter of fact Chamo was wheezing and sniffling already. Of course, he _was_ a smoker, so that was on him.

In the background, Kotaro dueled with a sword-wielding bearded and dashing robotic mannequin in elaborate purple Errol Flynn cosplay, both laughing defiantly at each other while pushing themselves to their limits. You know, the usual.

The rest of them faced a giant with a stony face, clad in the blackest of blacks, a threatening choice of attire not diminished by his choice of a short tunic skirt under which peeked out of a black bottom piece. Pumping a massive, granitic fist overhead, this titan boomed with an all imposing voice that would infuse fear into even the mightiest of hearts, making Sakurako, Chisame and Satomi to latch onto the stunned Negi, and Harumi, Abiru and the Ghost Cat on each other.

 **" I am the Revelation! The Tiger-Force at the core of all things! When you cry out in your dreams — it is Darkseid that you see!"**

"Y-Yes, Sir! Whatever you say, Sir!" Matoi found herself stuttering, while clinging to Chisame's back like a baby koala. Truthfully, it was usually Chisame or Negi she saw when she cried out in her dreams, but if this guy said so, then so be it!

 **"I. Am. The. New. God. All is one in Darkseid. This mighty body is my church. When I command your surrender, I speak with three billion voices. When I make a fist to crush your resistance. It is with three billion hands. When I stare into your eyes and shatter your dreams. And break your heart. It is with six billion eyes! Nothing like Darkseid has ever come among you. Nothing will again. I will take you to a hell without exit or end. And there I will murder your souls! And make you crawl and beg! And die! Die! Die for Darkseid!"**

"Wh-Wh-Which one of you came up with the idea to this, anyway?!" Harumi stuttered while pushing the large, robotic hairy brute with a mace that was clumsily approaching her away with a foot.

"L-L-Lala-san!" Sakurako said, doing the same to a skinny sinister fellow in a dark, long purple cloak and hood ensemble. "Sh-She said she based them on the scariest beings she knew of, and one of her childhood friends..."

"W-Wait, I know these!" Abiru pointed out, aiming a shaky finger at the boasting, larger than life figure and the armored bestial warriors with wings hovering above him. "From the news of Metropolis' invasion, five years ago... w-what did they call him? Doomsday?"

"No, that, that was the one that killed Superman-sama for a while," Matoi gulped. "This one's... Despero, I think?"

"No, Despero is the one who flattened Detroit... This is Thanos, I believe..." the Maomolin gulped.

Everyone looked a the ghost cat.

"What? I have TV at home too, you know!"

"Darskeid! This is Darkseid, dammit!" Chisame yelled. "He's just said it himself and everything!"

"Well, we were too scared by his tone to pay any attention to his words, sorry!" Harumi apologized in a huffing tone, making Chisame facepalm.

Negi blinked. "I never had realized this before, but why do so many aliens hate us, anyway? What did we ever do to them?"

"We made them look bad by making a movie called _Alien_?" Satomi suggested. "I mean, when you think about it, it's kinda racist."

"Boy..." a heavy set old woman in red, yellow and green cooed huskily with a voice creepily reminiscent of Ed Asner's, wrapping her thick fingers around Negi's hair and then pulling him towards her large bosom. "I can feel a warrior spirit in you... Come with Granny, Granny will make you a strong, proud fighter..."

"Old person smell, old person smell!" Negi protested. "Chisame!"

"I've got my hands full, Sensei!" Chisame claimed, pushing away a short, slimy green-skinned bald guy in a pervert's brown trenchcoat, getting awfully close to her while caressing her face. "Dammit, just like that girl to design something like this...!"

"Heh heh, don't resist, my pretty," the mechanized simulation chuckled, its tongue lashing around in circles. "You've got just the perfect face for the cameras, and a body to match too... Tell Sleez and be honest, you've got experience in 'showbiz', don't you...?"

That was when Negi saw red, just threw a foot through Granny Goodness' midsection, kicked her remains across the room, and then simply seemed to blink out of sight only to reappear a second later, punching through Sleez's head and shattering it to bits. "Leave Chisame alone!" he warned, with a pants-wetting roar that briefly made even the Darkseid-bot pause.

"...!" Harumi and Abiru said.

"He does kenpo. He's remarkable at it, as well," Satomi explained.

"Ahhhhh..." the two sempais said.

"Ach!" the Virman Vundabar attraction said, adjusting its monocle. "Kinder these days, I tell you! Falling into feral, savage love this early, I cannot understand it! How decadent, Mein Dunkel Gott!"

"It's not love, that'd be just wrong!" Negi and Chisame protested at once, their heads snapping in that direction as they unsteadily held hands.

"You realize it's animatronic, right?" Satomi said.

"Chachamaru," Chisame retorted.

"Leave my darling out of this!"

"Okay," Harumi decided. "I really feel like leaving now, please."

* * *

 _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ is the creation and intellectual property of Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha.

Thanks to Shadow Crystal Mage for the proofreading and editing.

* * *

 **You Broke My Heart with Fanservice.**

 **Chapter Three: Time Doesn't Pay! (Well, It Pays A Little, But After Taxes It's Just Not Worth It…)**

* * *

"Well, that was fun!" Negi smiled brightly as he, Chisame, Satomi, Matoi and Chamo finally walked back out into the daylight. After finally managing to take the Maomolin away from Abiru, Sakurako had returned with him to active duty, and Kotaro, Harumi and Abiru had, perhaps a bit too quickly, parted ways with Negi's kooky quintet shortly after. "The Haunted House should be a hit! I'm so proud of all of you..."

The exit was lonely enough that early in the morning they still felt mostly comfortable talking aloud out in the open, without having to resort to the usual code words ("We're practicing for a play!") or hushed tones whenever any 'uncomfortable' topic like magic or other Ala Alba business, or Chamo's sapience, came about.

"'Fun' isn't the word I'd use, but whatever," Chisame sighed. "So, where to now?"

"Why don't we go visit the cosplay contest?" Satomi suggested. "I believe you still have a chance to register..."

"Again with that? For the last time, no!" Chisame protested, crossing her arms and looking away shiftily.

"But, you know you want to!" Negi said. "And it's not like you'd need to sew something up in a hurry, we only need to quickly head back home and-!"

"I don't know what are you talking about, i-it's n-not like I have any costumes lying around or a-anything, no! Hmph!" Hasegawa cried, planting her hands on her ears. "Besides, if I enrolled, which I don't want to do at all ha ha that would be ridiculous, what makes you think I'd have any chance! This festival's swarming with pros and experts! Just look at that Batman heading here!" She pointed to where a tall, powerful figure cloaked in solemn black and gray came marching their way.

Negi adjusted his tiny bifocals. "Wow, he's good," he said. "Almost identical to the genuine article."

Chamo sniffed the air. "Um, Bro?"

"The ears are a bit longer than they should be," Satomi estimated, "but on the plus side, the physique is very accurate. I'm impressed, I was under the impression most individuals practicing cosplay were rather out of shape physically, yourself obviously excluded, Chisame..."

"Gee, thanks," Chisame said as Matoi nodded in happy agreement. "Stop staring at my ass, Tsunetsuki."

"Errrr, guys, actually..." Chamo swallowed hard.

Matoi huffed. "Don't you think you are praising Chisame-sama's beauty a bit too much in my presence, though? Be careful, Forehead, there's no need for an alleged genius to state the obvious... See, that's why I don't want Chisame-sama entering that silly contest either, her glory is only for me and Negi-sama to behold... Right, Negi-sama?"

"Um, why would you ask me something like that?!" Negi asked, blushing.

"Everyone, please listen to the ermine for once!" Chamo pleaded. "That guy heading right here, I can smell him, that's-"

"Now, Chamo, it's not fair to criticize the body odor of a devoted cosplayer under the bright sun," Negi chided him, gently closing his mouth with a finger. "The poor fellow must be cooking alive in that suit..."

"I figured out you'd be sympathetic to the plight of someone with bad body odor," Chisame dryly quipped. "But yeah, keep it low, Chamo, he's almost in listening range now..."

"I bet you most of that 'muscle' is only padding anyway..." Matoi got a last zing in before the Batman came to a halt before them, towering before the group.

"Ah... Good morning!" Negi greeted, waving at the stranger. "However, sir, if you are going to the Haunted House, I'm afraid you're heading towards the exit, the entrance is that other way..."

"Actually," the Bat said, "I was already in there."

"An early bird, I mean, Bat, huh?" Matoi smiled. "Did you enjoy the Gotham displays?"

"Hnh," the tall man said. "They were accurate enough."

"Wait a sec," Chisame said. "If you'd already been in there, why do you come back, and this way to boot? Did you leave your car keys inside, or what?"

"I had to pass around you to check Inugami and the others were far enough before I talked with you," the cosplayer said. "I don't mind the youkai's presence during our discussion, but you obviously haven't shared your secrets with his friends yet."

"Oh, no, they aren't Kotaro's friends, they're just his caretakers and-" Negi then gave him a stare that was as bewildered as those from the girls and Chamo.

There was a long pause.

"I'm Batman," Batman flatly said.

"See, this is right what I'd been trying to tell you!" Chamo finally cried loudly.

Negi's shoulders drooped as he sighed. "Well then, welcome back to Mahora, Batman-sama. It's nice to see you again, no lie..."

"Why are your ears longer this time, however?" Satomi asked.

"For improved radio reception, of course," the Bat said, tapping with a finger on a side of his cowl.

"Ah. Of course," Chisame faintly agreed. "Why did we even bother to ask?"

* * *

Izumi Ako turned the air conditioner on, gave a last absent-minded tug at the skirt of her nurse outfit, and sat down to wait for the first patient to ring at the door of the school nurse's office.

She wondered who would come first, and over what. And how many times would Kitsu-sempai be involved during the next three days. Honestly, that girl's family sure had to have very good contacts or she'd have been kicked out so long ago.

Ako smiled patiently, placed her hands on her knees, and waited.

After the first few minutes, she started wondering if the doorbell was, perhaps, broken. With that in mind, she walked over to the door, opened it, and peeked out. There was nobody at the doorstep other than the passersby who constantly went on their festive business along the street, all of them in perfect health and high spirits.

Curiously, Ako reached for her own bell, rang it, and saw it worked perfectly. After blinking twice, she made her peace with it, walked back in, and closed the door behind herself.

Sitting back on her chair, she picked up a magazine and tried to read it, but was quickly reminded any magazines found at any sort of healthcare office are bound to be utterly uninteresting and trite, and at least a decade old or so (for example, she had picked up a 1997 issue of 'Wrestling Fanatics' magazine about the acting career of Hulk Hogan). Sighing in frustration, she set the magazine aside and slumped forward miserably. She didn't mind staying indoors for the best part of a whole day in the name of others' wellbeing, but what was the point if there was no duty to attend to?

Where were the suffering and injury of her fellow students when she needed them the most?

Ako kept on waiting faithfully, regardless.

* * *

They sat under a tree at a prudent distance from any heavily transited paths, the Bat to one side, the gathered young people (and the questionable rodent) to the other.

"Before we say anything else," Negi spoke first, "I'm highly thankful you took the risk to come to us in the open like this. I understand it hardly suits your 'creature of the night' routine, walking across a School Festival just like this..."

"Actually, I had a phase when I would walk out in broad daylight all the time," Batman stoically reminisced. "Robin and I would go to public ceremonies and everything."

"Seriously?" Chisame asked. "I had heard of that, but I always thought your Mayor's office would just out two random actors in Batman and Robin costumes. You know, a local mascot type of thing."

"It's what everyone thought, I believe," Satomi added.

"That's why it was the perfect cover," Batman said. "But it couldn't last long. Times changed. Gotham... got rougher again. The Joker had another personality switch, and after that, it looked like every other criminal in the city followed his example. I had to change back, too."

"Well, if it's any consolation, the same thing seemed to happen everywhere," Chisame offered. "I mean, have you seen pictures of the Toyman ten years ago compared to how he looks today?"

"Which Toyman?" Negi asked.

"Well, not ours, of course," Chisame humphed. "I mean the American, naturally!"

"... we're going on a tangent again," Batman observed, since that seemed to happen a lot whenever he was involved in any sort of conversation with Ala Alba. "I came here because of the Joker, actually. Last time he was sighted, he was still in Japan, and this Festival venue is exactly the sort of large, crowded venue he prefers. Not to mention you helped to foil his plans last time."

"Right," Negi nodded, "and he departed with Tsukuyomi-san as well, didn't he? It's very unlikely she'll ever let go of her grudge against Setsuna-san. But, to infiltrate this Festival, that's almost impossible even for people like them..."

Chisame grumbled. "Yeah, just like it was impossible for all those Orphans, and that demon count, and those creep Masters of Rider and Monster, and-"

Satomi blinked. "How is it impossible? The tickets are dirt cheap."

"Rider and Monster?!" Batman said.

Negi nodded. "Ah, yes, that's right. We sort of forgot to tell you, since so many things have happened since you left, but we've gotten actual firsthand confirmation of more Servants in Mahora. But that's okay, we've reached agreements with four of them and their Masters already! Saber, Vigilante, Monster and Lancer. I'm confident we can help settling this situation as peacefully as possible!"

"..." Batman said. This wasn't completely unexpected, but he'd hoped he wouldn't have to deal with one of those Grail Wars on top of everything else. That hardly was his field of expertise at all. Better to stick with what he already had at hand in the meanwhile, either way. "We'll discuss that later, but first, you should know there might be a way the Joker has reached you already."

"Seriously?!" Negi gasped, the girls and Chamo showing serious signs of concern too.

"Regrettably, yes," the Dark Knight nodded. "While looking through your Haunted House, I found faint signs of a chemical known as norephedrine."

"Is that, is that dangerous?!" Chisame swallowed.

"In small doses like those I found, no," the Dark Knight admitted. "However, in large doses, it acts as a powerful stimulant of the nervous system, frequently found in the fear toxins of Jonathan Crane, the Scarecrow... who escaped Arkham Asylum with the Joker around Christmas and hasn't been seen ever since."

* * *

Standing in the middle of a major crossroads of several of the main streets of the Mahora campus, nearly at the very center of the Festival, Suzushiro Haruka stood in sandals and a white bikini that... well. It was rather revealing, but in a way that was far more casual than provocative, as if Haruka just had no idea a woman of her political stature probably should dress better than that for a public outing (and without Yukino by her side, that probably was the case indeed). The top, barely holding her large breasts back, looked likes she had just picked a thick piece of cloth, double wrapped it around her chest, and called it a day. The bottom was more concealing, helped by a small flimsy white cloth attached to it and further protecting her modesty, but it still showed off far more than usual of the habitually austere in fashion Vice President of the Student Council.

With a megaphone well in hand and mouth, she would address the masses circulating around her and her current aide. "Remember, the Mahora Disciplinary Committee will be mind-full of any and all lascivorous behavior on campus! While decimations of romantic love around the World Tree aren't expressively forbidden this year, there are limits you must respect! Remember, no means no, and no physical closity further than quick kisses will be tole-rated!"

The much shorter, thinner and flatter girl standing by her side, handing over fliers of Campus Safety to the passersby sighed. "I think the Department will be mindful, the behavior will be lascivious, the romantic love will be declared instead of decimated, and the deep kisses and such will not be tolerated, Sempai..."

"Of course they won't, that's why we're here, working hard for public morality!" Haruka grinned,with her hands on her hips, blissfully oblivious to how her chosen aide looked anything but decent or moral at all. If Haruka's two-piece still remained accidentally sexy without being a cause for arrest, Shirai Kuroko's micro-black bikini was positively scandalous and shocking, and those who walked around were split between violently looking away and staring intensely, depending on their opinions on the small body type, well, embodied by the lithe twin-tailed girl. "Shirai-san, keep your eyes reeled!"

"Don't you mean peeled?"

"That's right what I said, yes! At this time, Saotome Haruna's perversion are likely constrained in the Haunted House under Yukihiro's superveillance, but Yuuki Rito, the Perverted Beast, must be somewhere out there! Not to mention what the other schools might bring-"

"Ohhhh, hey, Haruka-saaaaaaan!" an annoying voice Haruka immediately recognized called out from the crowd, and Negi's seventh Ministra shuddered bitterly.

"See, what did I tell you..." she sighed, turning away from Kuroko to look at the goofily grinning brown haired boy coming out of the mass to greet her. "Shirai-san? This is Hyudou Issei from Honnouji, I had the Miss Fortune of knowing him during our visit to Kiryuin-san..."

"Oh, you remember my name correctly and everything!" the boy beamed a bright smile, edging closer towards Haruka before she, stonefaced, planted a hand on his face and pushed him back. "Why so cold otherwise, though?! I thought you liked me...!"

"Just because I didn't kill you then doesn't mean I like you! And I can remembrate given names fine, it's prostantives and sustannous I have problems with!" barked Haruka, who usually downright denied or flatly ignored all references to her diction problems. Then she huffed, giving the tall, buxom redhead with very long hair who had just arrived to Issei's side a barely any softer look. "Huh, and Gremory-san, too. You still haven't dropped this loser, for real?"

"Ah!" Kuroko gasped, pointing at the thin, purple strings this barefoot bombshell wore, barely covering the nipples on her melons and the crotch in her, ah, well shaved lower anatomy. "How indecent!"

Kuroko was a believer of the axiom that says if you're working with someone for the correct cause, then there's nothing wrong if you steal material from each other for your respective endeavors, that's just called sharing. And that also was the way she felt about Kotegawa Yui, of course. In pretty much everything not related to Misaka Mikoto, Yui and Kuroko had pretty much the exact same disciplinary mindset.

"... you're wearing even less than her, kid," Issei dryly accused, staring from between Haruka's fingers, still taking the time to ogle Kuroko's mostly bare body. He was an enthusiast of Oppai, but much like a certain connoisseur from Mundus Magicus, he wouldn't turn a blind eye to a nearly naked flat female torso either.

"Who gave you the right to stare at me, perv?!" Kuroko angrily wagged a pointer finger at him while the redhead with Issei laughed lightly.

"Oh, Suzushiro-san, your young friend is so adorable!" She bowed to her. Bounce, bounce. Kuroko twitched, staring at the two huge… tracts of land. "Nice to meet you, Miss. I'm Rias Gremory, President of the Honnouji Academy Occult Club. These," she gestured towards three other people walking by next to them, bounce, bounce, "are the rest of our members, other than Issei-san. Please meet Himehima Akeno-san..."

"Enchanted to meet you," gently bowed a fair skinned voluptuous beauty with very long black hair, clad in a white bikini that was even worse (or better) than Haruka's, but more decent than Kuroko or Rias' choices. Then she briefly looked aside, smiled charmingly, and waved at the fanfic's audience very briefly.

"Adorable?!" Kuroko protested. "And who's she waving at anyway?!"

"She thinks she's being watchered by perverts on the intersnets," Haruka sighed. "Just roll with it."

"... Kiba Yuuto-kun..." Rias continued, smoothly ignoring Kuroko's outburst. Bounce, bounce.

The blond, handsome young man who stood now next to Issei, shorter and more refined looking than the first boy, smiled pleasantly with a reverence just as deep as Akeno's bow. If Issei was a perfect example of a braindead shounen idiot, then Yuuto could very well be a textbook specimen of the talented ace non-villain pretty boy he had sparkles around him and everything, and no matter hat angel you looked a thim, there seemed to be a pastel backdroop to accompany it. "It's a remarkable pleasure, Madams," he softly said. Several girls in the crowd cooed and swooned before being forced to go leave by their relatives or boyfriends. Or not. Rias was very distracting. Fun for everyone!

Haruka and Kuroko only shared an unimpressed look.

"... and Toujou Koneko-chan!" Rias finally pointed at a petite (but not as much as Kuroko) girl who reminded Haruka a lot of Nagato Yuki, down to the neutral expression and choice of dark blue, one piece school swimsuit. Bounce, bounce.

"Hello," Koneko said, and wow, she was like Nagato even at that.

"So you joined a club, huh," Haruka looked at the grinning Issei again as he scratched the back of his head. "That's good, maybe the extra activation can suck off the excess of lecharious thoughts from your mind."

"Oh, rest assured I've been keeping Issei-san very busy since you left Honnouji, Suzushiro-san!" Rias said. Bounce, bounce. "I've always thought all individuals with potential should belong to clubs to help them channel their inner strenght! Just like you, I have heard, have benefited so much from your English Research Society..."

Haruka paused, small alarms instantly going off on her mind as Kuroko frowned. "Oh, so... you've heard of it already?" Haruka ended up saying, her tone uneasy.

Rias nodded. Bounce, bounce. Kuroko was grinding her teeth so hard she likely needed to see a dentist soon. "Yes, of course! My family wouldn't stop talking about it, shortly after your encounter with Mr. Wilhelm..."

Haruka's face went briefly pale as Kuroko asked, "Mr. What-something-or-other?"

Haruka coughed. "Nobody important, Shirai-san. Just someone who... briefly inconveniated Negi-sensei but was propiously dealt with. What was that gentleman to you, Gremory-san?"

"If you would just come aside with us for a moment," Koneko quietly said, "we'd gladly explain everything, Suzushiro-san."

Haruka scowled, then saw Issei wasn't grinning like some damn idiot anymore.

This had to be bad, then.

* * *

Someone finally knocked on Ako's door.

Ah! At last! Finally, she could justify sitting around on the first day's morning and leaving Makie, Yuuna and Akira to their own devices among people who were far more popular, attractive and interesting than her! A chance to prove she was a veritable angel of mercy, a fitting follower of the Nightingale Legacy, a true nurse Yohko-sensei could be proud of! And she wouldn't be bored to death anymore, either!

"I'm here, don't worry, please tell me about anything you may need!" she made her best smile while opening the door, gracefully inviting the newcomer to enter the office with a polite swing of her arm...

"Um, good morning," plain looking older girl with brown hair wearing a summer dress said awkwardly, standing at the doorstep next to a shorter but otherwise similar girl who was likely her sister, and a very short and flat girl in a plain blue one piece with round glasses, a long brown ponytail, and an expression that wouldn't have been out of place on Yue's face. "I think we got lost. You see, we're from Honnouji, and we were wondering if you could tell us the way to Mahora Future Land, please...?"

Ako's smile drooped, she reached into the pocket of her nurse skirt, and pulled out a small booklet she placed on the girl's hands. "Please follow all safety indications on the Festival Guide, which includes an accurate map of all attractions and stands, plus a helpful schedule of all events for the three days of Mahorafest," Ako lectured, in the droning, impersonal tone learned from the preparation sessions. "Now, if you aren't injured or feeling sickly at all..."

"I, I don't think we are, thank you for ask-"

"Are you really sure you aren't?!" Ako's tone suddenly perked up, her eyes going slightly glassy and manic, bearing not a little resemblance to Konoka on a healing rampage.

The other girl had a sweatdrop moment, then turned to her companions and asked, "Are, are you feeling alright, Haru-chan, Ruri-chan...?"

"Never felt better, Oneechan," the youngest girl bluntly said. "Why shouldn't I?"

"Same here," the other girl deadpanned. "Can we go now?"

"Ah, yeah, of course, well, thanks..." Onodera Kosaki bowed clumsily towards the almost devastated Ako, then turned around to follow her little sister and best friend away. "Ah, wait for me, please!"

"Wait!" Ako gasped, trying to reach out for them. "You seem a little sunburned, maybe I should take a look at-!"

But they already had disappeared back into the crowd.

Ako muttered miserably to herself, then closed the door again.

* * *

 _Under the tree, under the tree, nobody beat us, fry us and eat us in fricassee:_

"Sorry, but are you sure about that?" Negi asked. "How would the Scarecrow even reach us all the way over from, well, wherever he is?"

"Yeah, he wasn't one of the villains who were with Joker in Kyoto, so are you sure they'd even be working together anymore?" Chisame added.

"Yes, that chemical's presence is likely a coincidence," Satomi said. "We've worked with all sorts of materials to set up the Haunted House, after all." She sniffed. "It would not surprise me if _some_ people who delude themselves into thinking they are aliens thought that a little chemical assistance would be needed to make their part of the site more effective."

"Real subtle Hakase," Chisame said flatly.

"Has anyone from outside of your inner circle assist in with your installations?" Batman asked.

"Well, other than Ala Alba," Negi recalled, "it was just Nodoka-san and Yue-san, and they brought Rance-sensei in to help with the Gotham exhibits, but... Oh," his voice suddenly went very small, and his eyes very tiny.

Chisame, being Japanese and thus not easily accustomed to English phonetics and anagrams, just grew confused. "What? Are you saying that teacher is some sort of Gotham villain otaku? I admit that doesn't sound unlikely, but why bother risking a safe-"

"Chisame," Satomi quietly said, playing with the foreign spellings in her mind, "I believe I understand it now. 'Rance' is an anagram of the English name 'Crane'."

"What?!" Chisame gasped, then frowning and going over it herself. "Wait, Kuh-Rahne... Rahn-Ce... Oh. Oh, dammit! Out of all the idiotic-!" she cried, slamming a hand on her own face.

"..." Batman said. "If it makes you feel any better, it has happened to veterans as well..."

* * *

"It can't be!" Superman gasped as the figure in bulky green and purple power armor finally took their helmet off, revealing a familiar shiny bald head underneath. "Luthor! So you were Rex Thorul!"

"Well, I wouldn't just go around giving my real name while attracting your attention all over Metropolis, would I?!"

* * *

"It can't be!" Lois gasped as her gynecologist took off his false beard, revealing a airmail face. "Luthor! You were Dr. Holurt all along?"

* * *

"W-Wait," Negi further gasped, "is that for real, too? Lex Luthor is a supervillain? World famous philanthropist and benefactor Lex Luthor is a bad guy?!"

"..." Chisame, Satomi and Matoi said.

"Bro," Chamo finally spoke, "I know you're young and innocent, but really, we've gone through this before, you can't believe anything the newspapers say just because it's the view held by the majority..."

"But, but he's devoted so many millions to noble causes all across the planet!" Negi insisted. "What's next, Bruce Wayne is evil as well? Superman really IS an alien?"

"It wouldn't shock me," the Batman callously said, always too happy to throw others off his track no matter the means.

"Saotome is always going on about all those young boys he adopts as wards," Satomi said, nodding.

Negi gave him a sullen look, then said, "Okay. Right. If you say so, I'll believe you, of course. But there's no shame in the girls failing to notice it, they aren't that well versed on English naming and wordplay. It's all my fault, not only because I failed to realize it myself, but because I haven't been a good enough English teacher either...!"

 _"Now, now, don't be so harsh on yourself, you idiot, it's not like we're supposed to have learned college level English yet anyway,"_ Chisame said in perfectly smooth, if accented English, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Besides," Matoi pointed out, "even if the names are similar, that doesn't mean for sure they're the same guy, Negi-sama. For all we know they're two completely different American teachers who are lanky and scrawny, have pet crows, are really into books, act all creepy and sinister the whole time, and oh wow I'm sounding so stupid right now I'd better stop."

"I'm going to need that professor's address right now," the Caped Crusader said.

Negi nodded with a sad sigh. "Of course. In the meanwhile, I guess you'll also want us to close down the Haunted House, won't you?"

"Not yet," the Dark Knight surprised him. "If this has some sort of part in the Scacrecrow's latest scheme, we'll force his hand by suddenly shutting it close. And there's no telling what might happen then, not until I've confronted him. Tell your people to be on the lookout but acting normally while I go... talk things over with him. In the meanwhile, you should head over to the infirmary immediately. You might have been poisoned."

Negi nodded, standing up quickly. "Of course! Good luck then, Batman-sama. Or perhaps we should go-"

"No. This is strictly between Crane and me. It'll be okay. We're... old acquaintances, after all."

"Yeah, well, I guess it's not like you haven't gone through this dozens of times before," Chisame mumbled. "I still feel so stupid, though. To think we didn't ever get the whole Rance-Crane thing..."

"Oh, we didn't even have any idea we should be on the lookout for something like that, did we?" Chamo shrugged. "Besides, we aren't Batman-sama here. He's like the only one in the world who always would catch on anything like this no matter what..."

Batman would probably have thanked him in his own way, even, if he hadn't already vanished away after getting the address he wanted from Negi.

* * *

 _Washington, DC:_

"Senator Rusk, Sir?" the aide peeked into the room. "The press is all set, Senator, they're waiting for your speech- Oh, sorry!"

The tall, bald Senator quickly pushed away the makeup kit he'd been applying on himself and gave the hapless aide a murderous, savage glare before softening back just as soon. He smiled pleasantly. "It's okay, Wendell. My own fault for taking so long. I'll be there right now..."

The aide quickly nodded and retreated in a nervous hurry while Dell Rusk chuckled fiendishly to himself, fixing his tie and thinking of the great projects ahead.

Nobody was wise to him yet, after all, and without the Super Soldier around anymore, the costumed fools of this era would be nothing for him...!

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Yes, Negi-kun?" a highly amused Saotome Haruna said, still wiping tears of laughter from the corners of her eyes with a hand while the other held her Pactio card against her forehead.

She was wearing an elaborate, sinister and yet eerily sexy mermaid costume, one that had been even skimpier and sexier before Yue, Nodoka, Chisame and Ayaka had put their hands on it and literally forced an extensive redesign. It all had been Akira's fault in a sense, actually; after she had told them of how she first became a Sailor Senshi, Haruna saw a large artistic potentialion the mostly unexplored side of mermaids as horror stories, and so she had created a whole seafaring-themed room (slightly influenced by how many of her childhood relations had felt about the wet stuff) where she lured unsuspecting visitors into her uncomfortable teasing grip of doom, which they would invariably escape from in panic after she had related a few of her fantasies, only slightly exaggerated for the occasion.

She'd only had a few visitors so far, what with it still being early in the first day, but so far, so good! And then of course she had to get that call between guests...

"Whaddya mean we've been infiltrated?!" she almost yelled into the card itself.

"It's only a theory so far," Negi's voice said, "but a very solid one, apparently. It's the real Batman, Haruna-san, and he's not the kind to joke about matters like this... or any other, really. Please be very careful, I'll also be contacting Iinchou right now, and Satomi-san is telling Sakurako-san and-"

"And the culprit is Rance-sensei, you say?!" Haruna gasped. "Sensei, do you know what is this gonna do to Nodoka? -She really liked that guy! I mean, in a hopefully totally platonic way, even I have some kind of standards... Anyway, the point is, it's taken so much to get to trust men...!"

"Well, that's why I'm trusting you to break the news to her and Yue-san," Negi's voice sighed. "I'm very sorry to dump this on you, but you're much closer to them than we are, and if anyone knows how to share the news with them, that'll be you."

Haruna began gnawing on a thumb. "Geez, Negi-kun, normally I'd be elated about someone trusting me for once, but...!"

"Please, it's urgent to warn them quickly," Negi's voice pleaded. "They must keep their distance from Rance-sensei until this situation is sorted out! As for you, please don't stay indoors too long, and don't sniff anything that looks suspicious at all..."

"Okay, got that, don't you worry," Haruna sighed. "And what will you be doing?"

"I'm taking Chisame, Satomi-san, Matoi-san and Chamo to the infirmary so they can get blood tests..."

"And you'll be getting one as well, naturally," Haruna pointed out sternly.

"... r-right. Of course I was. W-why wouldn't I? Please, at the first sign of anything strange– er, stranger than usual– or actually dangerous, contact us at once and evacuate the manor as safely as you can. Will you do that, Haruna-san?"

She smiled and nodded, even though he couldn't see her right now. "Of course I will, Negi-kun, don't worry. Everything will turn out okay, you'll see. You'd better not miss your date with your sister either..."

"It's a duel with the Black Rose Baron!" Negi's voice protested awkwardly.

"See, you must be alright after all. I'd only start worrying if you begun accepting the truth already..."

* * *

In her Spirit form, invisible to the masses gathered beneath her, Servant Ruler oversaw the Mahora Festival from a tall rooftop, quietly pondering the atmosphere reigning in the festivities.

She was not against major celebrations on general principle- He that she had devoted her life to had once turned water into wine to keep a party going, after all, and He was above the hypocrisy of those who blamed others on charges on frivolity and debauchery, only to indulge into actual vice behind closed doors. Still, all these displays of bare flesh, in such a casual way, couldn't help making her slightly nervous and even judgmental of this era's ways. Why, in her times, there never was anything like this! Were these people heading down the path of Sodom?

She caught site of a bush moving and a spiritual eyebrow twitched. Apparently they were. She virtuously looked away, totally not finding it hot at all. Nope, no, not even a little.

Well, in any case that was not for her to decide. She was an angel of mercy, not a Spirit of Vengeance like an Avenger or that creepy guy in the green cloak . And her current objective was forcefully restrained to overseeing the Holy Grail War and its results. In matters concerning these troubled times' average goings ons, she could only have faith both in the Lord and the world's faithful to guide the rest of mankind into eventual Paradise and victory. In the meanwhile, she would pray to the best extent of her faith for them...

Putting her hands together and closing her eyes, Ruler began praying... and then shivered.

She had just felt them, all over the campus, several major burst of prana literally exploding into existence. So many Servants at once?! Greatly alarmed, Ruler sprang into alert, gripping her weapon as she materialized, and then... before she could leap towards the closest point of increased magical presence, her eyes caught something just as troubling happening in the street below. It was surely divine providence and totally had nothing to do with the fact they passed the bush. Totally not. She wasn't even looking at the bush. At all. Nope, not at all.

Walking alongside a girl with short red hair was someone she had not seen for the longest of times. At first, Ruler tried to tell herself that couldn't possibly be her, that it had to be an incredible coincidence. After all, that person's looks were relatively common, and even someone as normal as Kugimiya-san, from Profesor Negi's group, physically resembled her a lot. But then Ruler leaned forward to get a better look (totally not to keep the woman and the bush in sight at the same time, nope, nope, of course not!), and her sharp eyes confirmed that yes, that was her. Her ears further assured her when she heard the young woman with short black hair asking her companion about a few souvenirs sold at the closest stands. That voice, Ruler would never forget. The voice of one of the Twelve, the fallen one.

Next to this, even the presence of even more Servants took a back seat. Frowning grimly to herself, Ruler jumped down, ready to meet that person again.

* * *

Ako sighed. "I'm an awful person..." she told herself after a lot of heartfelt pondering. "Seriously, what have I been thinking?"

She should be happy no one was having any health problems or accidents! So what if it was boring? Was she so desperate to drive needles into people's butts? Uhhhh... that is, was she so desperate to prove herself? No! That couldn't and shouldn't be, she had to be better than that!

Sitting up straighter in her chair, Ako forced a smile and resolved to be glad for everyone, and pray her services weren't needed at all at any point during the Festival, and-

"Coach!" one of the boys of the football team she managed shouted, pushing her door open with a foot- not kicking it, this must be stressed- while he and one of his buddies held an tall, unconscious, brown-haired boy between them. "Sorry to disturb you, but we found this guy unconscious at the side of the road to the water slides! You've gotta take a look at him, Coach, he won't wake up no matter what!"

Ako's eyes grew starry as she all but leapt from her seat, all former resolutions quickly pushed back. A truly wide smile crept its way up her pale face in a creepily Konoka-esque sort of way. "Of course...! Put him on that bed right now, will you, Sorata-kun...?!"

And then Ako recoiled, as she caught a casual glance at the back of the unconscious boy's right hand. On his skin, there were several intrincate designs in crimson, like those Emiya-sempai had...

Oh, no.

No doubt, God surely was punishing her now over her earlier, nasty and selfish thoughts...

* * *

"Oh, wow, so this is what a School Festival is like...!" Mashu Kyrielight said dreamily as she wandered through the crowded streets, happily drinking in all the sights around her. Upon arrival, in a spot fortunately concealed from the locals, she had quickly changed her battle attire for a simply gray ensemble fitting the lowly intern of a large corporation, complete with thick glasses, a long skirt, a long open jacket over her blouse, and ugly black shoes.

Despite everything, her current surroundings simply delighted her, and she truly wished she could get to spend more time enjoying them. But alas, as long as Sempai and the others remained lost, her duty remained clear, and she couldn't be distracted from it! From what she had read on such large festivities, there always was a booth for dealing with lost people somewhere, where she could ask for lost friends, family members, and the occasional small pet or wallet to be found and delivered at once. Now all she had to do was to find such a place...

"E-Excuse me!" Shielder said, reaching over towards a passing girl around her own height, wearing some sort of black sailor fuku with a large dark red and yellow eye design on a side of her chest, not to mention a gigantic cosplay tool that almost looked like half of a set of scissors attached to her back like a sword. "Miss, I'm kind of lost here, I'm afraid, and I've lost track of several friends! Could you please tell me the way to the Lost and Found...?"

"Oh?" the black haired girl blinked, casually looking back at her over her shoulder. "Ah, no, I'm not from around here. But actually, I'm looking for someone myself, so now that you mention it, maybe I should be going there as well..."

Mashu blinked. "Oh, is that so? W-Well, then maybe we could head there together, there must be someone close who-"

"I'm sure there is," the other girl agreed, quickly reaching over to casually grab a random passing boy by the collar of his shirt. "Hey, you! You look like a local, where's Lost and Found?!"

"O-Over there, two straight streets that way, Ma'am!" the skinny fellow gasped, fearfully pointing in another direction before the girl simply shoved him back into the crowd just as casually.

"Thank you," she matter-of-factly said, then began quickly pacing her way over there, with Mashu pausing only a moment before following her. "So, where you from? Ohtori? No way you're from Honnouji..."

"Actually, you could say I'm from a foreign school... Chaldea, if you must know," Mashu replied, figuring out this strange person couldn't be bothered to look the name up afterwards, and even if she did, she'd just figure out Mashu had lied. "My name's Mashu Kyrielight, pleased to meet you..." she added, because otherwise, she liked being honest and kind.

The girl nodded absently. "Matoi Ryuko. Likewise. Just a bit of warning, though, as soon as you find your friends, keep them and yourself away from me. I might get myself involved in a fight real soon."

"You will?" Mashu said, genuinely puzzled by this peculiar sincerity. "Um, don't tell me you've come all the way from another Academy just to pick a fight with someone...?"

Matoi shrugged insolently. "So what if I did?"

Shielder, realizing that, in a way, the same principle also applied to herself, chose to not answer that. She was supposed to stay out of each Singularity's everyday affairs, and even out of any major affairs not related to the Grail Wars. This girl was obviously no Servant, so technically her issues weren't her concern, but still, she wished she could talk her out of anything she would later regret.

Instead, she asked, "Maybe you've seen my friends around? A large bunch of eccentric, oddly dressed cosplayers following around a completely normal-looking dark-haired average-protagonist-type boy of the sort you can find anywhere?"

"You've just described sixty percent of all people in this Festival," Matoi dryly snarked, pointing around at several randomly passing bickering and laughing groups that mostly fit that description perfectly. Japan, Land of the Unwanted Crazy Harem. "Can you be any more specific? And by the way, did any of them carry one of these around?" she added, poking at the massive weapon on her back. One that, on closer inspection, and much to Mashu's trepidation, did not look fake at all.

"Uh... no, nothing exactly like that," Mashu conceded. "There was a long haired young lady in a kimono with horns, and two girls in pirate clothes, and an ill-smelling man who should be looking around at all the doujin stands, and a tall and handsome lanky man with silver hair, and a nice girl who looks like she's wearing a giant jellyfish for a hat, and a samurai, and-"

Matoi gave her a cynical look and gestured at her with a hand to stop as they walked. "The question should be, not 'where they are?' but 'why do you want to find them?' They sound like a complete crew of nuts, and you look... well, so normal..."

"They're my friends!" Mashu immediately protested, somewhat offended by that choice of words. "Surely you have your own friends who are kind of socially awkward, but whom you still care about a lot, and they care back too!" For some reason, many people around them suddenly sneezed.

"No, of course I don't, I'm much more of a lone- crap," Matoi bit her tongue as she came to a sudden halt, right before being pounced upon by a small streak in a white shirt and bikini bottoms, quickly followed by a tiny, chortling boy in swimming trunks and a small, drooling dog, all of whom slammed her down onto the sidewalk as Mashu gasped loudly.

"RYUUUUU-KOOOOOO!" the short, brown-haired, but quite busty girl who had just tackled Matoi down and now squeezed her in a hug hard and loving enough as to make Matoi's eyeballs pop cried, rubbing her cheek up and down Matoi's cheek while the boy hugged Matoi's right leg and the dog humped the left energetically. "Where have you been, you disappeared almost as soon as we arrived! Mom and Daddy were so worried for you, they went in to call out for you, and oh wow, you've made a new friend here already?! So nice to meet you how do you I'm Mankanshoku Mako Ryuko's best friend and ever loyal comrade battle aide sidekick and you could even say girlfriend in the sense we're both girls and also friends although I'm always open to anything did I already say how do you do?!"

From the large speakers of the building next to them, the Festival Committee office, a deafening message came out, heard all over Mahora. "Attention, your attention, please! The Mankanshoku family from Honnouji is looking for a lost child! Matoi Ryuko-chan, a, um, lovely and cute sexy girl who is kind of rough but also very sweet and kind, Ryuko-chan please don't get into any fights over your head and report here to the Doctor, his wife, and your girlfriend in the sense that you're both girls and friends although she's always open to anything immediately! Thank you."

"Lost CHILD?!" Ryuko screamed, getting up so violently she threw the Mankanshoku siblings and their little dog too around in all directions without even intending to. "Lovely and cute?! Sexy?! OVER MY HEAD?!-?!"

Mashu just blinked again, glasses slightly dropping down her nose. "Ah," she belatedly said. "Nice to meet you as well, Mankanshoku-san."

* * *

Not terribly far away, Shirou's cellphone rang.

"Who is that?" asked Taiga, momentarily distracted from her musings on the lost girl message they'd just heard. She leaned closer, taking a look over Emiya's shoulder, and smiled at the text on the small screen. "Oh, Negi-kun, huh? Wonder what's 3-A up to this time?"

"Negi?" Illya asked, her attention also distracted long enough for Miyu to quietly shift around, now walking by the other side of Luviagelita. It w-wasn't that she disliked this heiress of the Einzberns or anything, far from it, but even if Luvia hadn't warned her about that family previously, Miyu would still have felt somewhat unnerved by the close attention the albino was giving her.

"It... It must be something about the Haunted House," Shirou uneasily said, reading the message that only said ' _Please call me back soon_ '. "I helped with some of the installations, you see..."

"Oh, so you're some sort of hired hand, Mister Sherou?" asked Luvia, who had an interesting way of pronouncing his name. "A Sherou for hire as it were?" She tittered at the lame pun.

"Shirou's technical skills are considerable, but he doesn't take mercenary advantage of them, if that's what you mean," Saber soutly answered for him, keeping steady tabs on the hostile spiritual presence gravitating all around the rich blonde. "He'll gladly help fellow students and teachers alike for free."

"I see," Luvia smiled. "Well, I've always thought one's talents should be rewarded invariably, for fairness' sake. I'm sure Rin would agree with that, wouldn't you, Rin?"

 _If you had any talent at all, that is!_ Luvia's casual glance towards Rin said.

Rin, walking on the other end of the wide formation with Vigilante circling her and just as tense as Destroyer, let out a small Ojou laugh. "Oh-ho! Why, I wouldn't even dream of telling Emiya-kun how to best display his talents, but then, I'm not as talented as others in dictating the way they should lead their lives!"

"Neesan," Sakura said in a very small sigh under her breath.

Luvia and Rin shared a charged killer glare even as their Servants stirred and got ready to do battle, but ultimately nothing came out of it, much to Vigilante and Destroyer's disappointment. "I apologize to Mr. Sherou (and only to him) if he feels I have overstepped my boundaries with my opinion."

"N-Not at all, why would you say that...?" Shirou stiffly laughed before sending another text message in response. _Very busy right now, sorry._

Taiga, still nosing in, hummed. "Shirou, that's not like you, since when do you refuse to help? Negi-kun's still a kid, he must be over his head again. Why don't you go check on him?"

"Oh yes! I could go along as well!" Illya eagerly offered.

Shirou gulped. In truth, his Hero Sense was going into overdrive telling him to go help, but he had the dreaded feeling disaster would quickly ensue if he left the Tohsaka sisters alone with Edefelt-san and Taiga. "Are... Are you sure? It wouldn't be like a gentleman, to desert a group of ladies in the middle of-"

Sakura sighed. "Go on, Sempai, we'll be fine. Why wouldn't we? I'm sure Sensei needs your help right now more than we do."

Saber nodded. "That's right, Shirou. I've got a feeling about this, too."

Shirou swallowed. "Well, if you think so..."

* * *

"Do you realize," the figure in armor growled, towering over Minako threateningly, "the exact nature of the mistake you've just made...?"

One of the young men with Shirley's compatriots, one Akira thought looked familiar for some reason, tried to intercede as Minako simply stood her ground fuming, Shiho going pale as she gave the armored person a better look. "Now, now," he said, "why to ruin a day as beautiful as this over something so small? Why don't we all-"

"Silence, who has asked for your opinion in this?!" the stranger said, roughly pushing him back with a gauntlet as the others gasped. "I don't remember having- having-!"

Mordred stopped herself short of completing the sentence when she saw three people running past them, almost a full street away, but drawing enough attention to them for the Knight of Treachery's sharp senses to hear them in their rush. Two of them mattered nothing to her, some little girl and some ginger. However, the one going after the young man, the individual in a white bikini and holding a water gun...

They were out of sight almost as soon as they'd appeared, and Mordred knew they hadn't noticed her, but she was certain she recognized that unmistakable face (after all, with so many just like it in Chaldea she saw it practically everywhere). Doing an abrupt turnaround, she barked a guttural, "You aren't worthy of my time!" before bolting after the trio with surprising speed for someone wearing something so heavy looking, and mindlessly pushing people out of her way as she went.

"Yeah, well, that's my line, pal!" Minako barely resisted the urge to flip the bird at the jerk's retreating back before the British students. "You should be ashamed of yourself, giving these people the wrong idea about our country, you lunkhead! Geez, sorry, guys, I swear most of us aren't rude and foul mouthed like that fuc-"

"Never mind, I think that was a fellow countryman anyway, Miss," Milly Ashford calmly said, holding a hand up towards the agitated fellow blonde. "Our apologies, but big events seem to bring the worst from us sometimes, at least this isn't a football game... Are you okay, Suzaku-kun?"

The brown haired boy nodded. "Yes, thanks for asking, President, that was only a grazing-"

"Suzaku?" Akira gasped, a hand on her mouth. "Kururugi Suzaku?! Oh, I thought I had recognized you! The son of the former Prime Minister...?!"

This boy blinked, then smiled meekly, with a hand behind his head. "Ah, yes, that'd be me. You really recognized me that easily? I've been studying abroad so long I'm surprised people here still remembers me..."

"We have several friends who are very big on all kinds of celebrities!" Baka Pink explained. "And they won't stop talking on-"

"Master?" one of the pale fair haired attendants, the one with smaller breasts, suddenly asked the other, shorter young man, curtly interrupting Makie's explanation as the gymnast froze in place. CRUSHED! "I think Leysritt and I should go look in on something for a few moments, if you will..."

The very slim boy with the deep purple eyes nodded pensively. "Of course, Sella."

"Master," Sella thanked with a nod, and then, without another word, she and her sister (at least, Minako guessed they had to be sisters) quickly went after the stranger's way.

"Hey!" Minako said. "You don't have to chase after him, you'll only get lost, girls!"

"Let them go," their Master said, with his hands on the handles of his sister's wheelchair. "They'll be fine."

"Oh, it's not their first time at Mahora, then?" Akira asked.

The boy shook his head. "No, they've never been to Japan before. But they're just that able."

Shiho rubbed up and down her arm, still looking that way as well. "That guy... There was something so scary about him...!"

"Her," Tate quietly corrected.

The others stared at him but for the dark skinned teacher. In turn, he and the teacher stared back, blinking.

"Seriously," Villeta said after a brief confused pause, "isn't it obvious that was a woman?"

"I'd have thought the metal skirt would give it away," Tate said.

* * *

 _The Nurse's Office:_

"Izumi-san!" Negi said as he hurried in with Chisame, Chamo, Matoi and Satomi in tow. "Sorry to disturb you, but someting urgent has come up!"

"Yeah, well, same here, Sensei," Ako nodded, patting the chest of the young man on the infirmary first bed. There were four of them, since it was a large enough installation intended to deal with several cases at once in the event of an emergency. "I think you might recognize this?" she asked, grabbing the boy's hand and holding it up so the newcomers could see the red markings on it.

"Command Seals?!" Negi gasped. "Izumi-san, when did you-?!"

Ako sighed. "He was brought in a couple minutes ago, and I thought I recognized the marks from when you introduced me to Emiya-sempai. So do you think they're real...?"

Negi, after a moment of doubt, walked up to the older boy, grabbed his hand, and studied it carefully, tracing the flesh with his fingers. "They look legit to me. Maybe this is the Master of Archer or Assassin. But where's his Servant...?"

"Maybe it's been killed off already?" Ako asked.

"I think the Seals would already be gone then, wouldn't they?" Chisame tried to remember. "Maybe the Servant was captured or weakened and left somewhere else. Or maybe... this is a trap set for us? Who brought him here anyway?"

"A few boys from my football team, I have no reasons to distrust them," Ako said. "They found him sleeping at the side of the road... um, Sensei, but what brought you in the first place, sorry if I interrupted you...?"

"We'd like to have a few blood tests taken," Negi said, already rolling up a sleeve, "since we might have been poisoned with something..."

"Oh dear!" Ako gasped, growing agitated. "Then, then please sit down already, all of you! I, ah, I'm afraid I'm not experienced with blood tests, but I, I'll call Yohko-sensei, or Mikado-sensei, or-!"

"In a pinch, I can do it," Matoi calmly offered. "I dated a Med Student once, you know."

"Tsunetsuki," Chisame said. "I don't doubt you did your best to, ah, prepare yourself back then, but this still should be left to a professional..."

"Sensei, what happened?!" Shirou asked as he barged in without warning, startling them, especially Ako, and Chamo. "You told me to meet here, are you alright?!"

"Gah!" Chisame said, recoiling as she saw Illya closing the door behind her after aloofly walking in after Saber and Shirou. "And what's she doing here?! Furthermore, where's your Servant, you little-?!"

"I'm here," Sayoko humbly said, speaking from behind Chisame as the hacker and her stalker cringed back from her, further shocked. "Sorry for this manner of entrance, but when I follow the young Master around, it is for the best if I do it with the utmost stealth I'm capable of..."

"I, I don't mean you, who are you anyway?!" Chisame stuttered. "I mean the big guy, the... oh, I forgot, it's only Saber who can't go invisible, right?"

"That is correct, Berserker is right here as we speak," Saber said, already by the fallen boy's side and analyzing his hand carefully. "Well, I would say you did the right thing by calling us. And where would _his_ Servant be, then...?"

"Another Master!?" Shirou almost choked, while in the background Ako muttered about skewed priorities and forced Satomi to sit down.

Illya's eyes sparkled. "Well, finally! And in such an advantageous position, too! Berserker, kil-"

"What? NO!" Shirou stopped, stepping in between her and the bed with his arms spread open. "Why are you going to kill a guy you don't even know as soon as you see him?!"

"Because he's an enemy Master, obviously?" Saber and Illya said together.

"Even leaving the very questionable morals of that aside, you've said you don't really care about the Grail, only about Negi and I, Illya-chan!" Shirou protested. "So why that sudden anxiety to get a lead anyway?!"

Illya sighed cutely. "What a bother, Oniichan, even if that's not my main goal, what's the harm in winning the War while I'm at it? But it's okay, I know you care after all. If you want to be the target of my attentions before anyone else, that can certainly be arranged..." she giggled threateningly as Berserker appeared in the room, his head grazing the ceiling fan while Ako, Chamo and Chisame gasped in alarm.

Shirou just stared down at her. "You know perfectly well what I mean!"

Illya pouted. "Oh, poo! You're no fun at all, I swear. I should be asking, instead, why you'd risk your life for the sake of someone you don't even know. He looks like nothing but a bad duplicate of you anyway."

"That much is right," Saber nodded. "Everything about him looks to me like a second rate Shirou."

"A bootleg copy when they couldn't afford the original guy," Satomi nodded as well as Ako bravely tried to take her blood sample without actually looking at the blood.

"A recolor, a Player Two Insert Coin character, a knockoff made for the spiritual sequel of the game..." Chamo mused aloud, rubbing his chin.

"To sum it up," Matoi added, pushing Ako aside and expertly taking Satomi's blood sample herself, "while our Emiya-san is hardly the most compelling of characters, this guy has the face of someone who is just as interesting asleep as he's awake."

Shirou facepalmed. "And you guys can tell all of this just from looking at him? Okay, I feel thankful you already think I'm better, and I'll admit I feel an odd kindship of sorts with him, but..."

Someone knocked on the door.

After a moment of pause, Sayoko walked to the door, opened it just enough to peek out, and asked someone out of sight from the rest of those inside. "Yes...? I'm terribly sorry, but we're in the middle of an emergency quarantine, and- I see."

She quietly closed the door back, turned her head back to the others, and said, "There's a person in armor asking to see their father."

Saber blinked. "What...!"

"DEMANDING, not ASKING!" the armored person shouted, Sayoko swiftly stepping aside right before the door was brutally kicked open from the outside, and Saber gasped aloud, seeing the intruder who was now stomping in. Wordlessly, Sayoko picked the door back up, placed it back where it belonged, and dutifully began fixing it back in place with a helpful set of tools left next to the entrance, because this was Mahora after all. The stranger's gaze, through the narrow eyeslits of their helmet, fell squarely on the paling Saber while Illya smirked and gestured for Berserker to stand back, her curiosity piqued. "So! It is true, then! You are here, and my eyes had not deceived me, FATHER!"

"... father...?!" Shirou said in a very squeaky and not characteristic voice as Negi sneezed for some reason.

"No, seriously, what the hell...?!" Chisame gasped, even as Matoi obliviously made her sit down to tenderly take her blood sample next.

"Yes, I'm his father," Saber grimly said, summoning and invisble Excalibur to her hand while the other kept holding her water gun. "What a strange twist of fate, son of mine. To think our differences would be settled here out of all of places..."

"It really doesn't look like the right stage for a showdown between a legendary father and son," Negi nervously agreed, his staff as ready as possible. "Maybe you could take it elsewhere...?"

"You stay out of this!" Saber and the stranger commanded him at once, and Negi only could shrink back. Then the stranger pointed at the prone figure, demanding, "But first, let go of my Master at once!"

"... this is your Master?" Shirou asked, pointing at the KOed Ritsuka.

"It's what I just said, isn't it, you fool?!"

Matoi chuckled and smiled at Satomi while taking a sample of her own blood. "Were we right or what, Forehead? Even in that...!"

Satomi nodded. "Quite correct, I'm glad we at least can agree on this particular subject..."

"... are you imbeciles making fun of me?!" Mordred growled.

Her attractive father sighed. "No, this is the way they are no matter what. They are not bad people regardless... well, most of them are not, at least..."

* * *

 _Somewhere else:_

"I mean," Tamamo-No-Mae said, a hand still wrapped around the other Caster's throat, pinning her down against the wrecked floor, "if I were planning to kill you, I'd have done it already, right? I don't have anything against you, really, and for the last time, I don't want to wish for anything on that Holy Grail, either. Mikoooon," she moaned, "you really are even more of a headcase than your teen version. At least she could make decent pancakes."

Medea looked up at her, her hood falling around her shoulders after their brief but very heated close quarters confrontation. They'd just appeared out of nowhere moments ago, these two Servants, simply materializing through all of the carefully set traps and wards Medea had set up over weeks to protect her and her man's home. Then when she had reacted as anyone else in her situation and tried her best to kill them, they simply plowed through her defenses and made a fool out of her! And she really thought she would have had a chance against the fox-woman in the blue kimono alone, but that insufferable lanky man who currently rested his back against the room's door, arms folded insolently, had turned the tables against Medea too much.

Anything she would throw at him, he'd just instantly bat it away with his huge, red and black spear, as if he barely noticed the attacks coming his way, while the insufferable fox pressed on with her own attacks on Medea's defenses. Before anyone in the neighborhood could notice, and most of them were gone for the Festival anyway, they'd brought Caster down and now stood over her. The Witch still held her twisted dagger in her hand, and still hoped for an opening to strike the woman with it, but even though the man had withdrawn his weapon back by now, she knew she would have no chance of taking him right after her; he was clearly much faster and stronger.

At the very least, Wataru-sama wasn't around to see her ignominious defeat. She only hoped they would go away after slaying her, instead of waiting for him. Because this fox demon had to be lying, there was no way they'd spare her...

"Hmmmm?" Tamamo went, cocking her head aside, furry ears twitching. "Don't you have anything to say about that? I bet our Medea would! Actually, aren't you even going to ask about the other Medea?"

"I have no interest in your mindgames," Caster stoically said. "You have prevailed, so just do what you must now. It is foolish to toy with a defeated foe."

"Seriously? You of all people are saying that? Because you're so much of the type who would keep a beaten foe around, just to make a slave out of them," the fox commented, in a playfully barbed tone that hit Caster a bit too close for comfort.

The man sighed. "Caster, please. She's right about something, why waste time like this? The Master-"

"Quiet, Lancer, do you think you care about Goshujin-sama more than I do?" the fox groaned to him. "But he'd want us to deal with this before we go looking for him, and a wife's got to respect her husband's wishes before anything else! I'm sure he's okay, I can feel it through our everlasting and unbending connection!" she dreamily added.

"If you say so..." the Lancer apathetically said, looking aside and slumping his shoulders slightly.

"Now," the fox lightly scratched Medea's nose with a fingernail, "why aren't you a good witch, obey the magnificent goddess like a woman from your age is supposed to do, and put that Rule Breaker down? It won't be enough, and I think you know that much by now. Don't make this harder for us, we're two of a kind, after all..."

Then she grinned and held Caster by the shoulders, giving them a couple of rougher than necessary rubs. "Orrrrr try your luck if you want to, so you'll just get yourself mauled already! Only you can choose your destiny, after all! Even gods shouldn't dictate your actions, that's my motto!"

"I thought your motto was 'all's fair in love and war'?" the man absently mused, already beginning to put some of the broken and-slash-or-scattered furniture of the room back in place.

Tamamo rolled her eyes around. "What do you know about me anyway? I'd like to think I've spent as much of my time avoiding you as possible. Well, fellow Caster?" she smiled back at the subdued Servant. "What do you say? Will you be a dear and help? Then maybe we can help you back, too. Well, I might help, that is. Lancer is remarkably bad at helping at all with anything not related to a battlefield."

"That might be sadly true, and so I apologize in advance," the man quietly said, fixing one of Caster's framed pictures as best as possible, "but I'll still try my best. Now, would you come to an agreement already? Why is that so difficult for Casters to achieve...?"

Medea looked incredulously at the fox's smug face. "Are you really a Caster? But why? There should be no room in a single War for two of us..."

The other Caster gave a small, casual shrug with a chuckle. "I suppose we aren't in the same level at all, but yes, we obviously share a Class. Then, are we friends from here on, or what...?"

Medea exhaled very deeply and pulled the dagger back into spiritual reserve. "I'm not good at being a friend to anyone," she admitted, "but I imagine the least I could do is offering you some tea over your mercy..."

* * *

Skuld looked at her cute wristwatch, which was decorated with the design of a blue mechanical dolphin. If everything was going according to the schedule, Negi should be activating his Cassiopeia around now, and Chao's plans could enter their second stage already. At last. Skuld was certainly growing sick of waiting for it, and right at the moment, being stuck with Keiichi, Natsumi and Yuuna at the water animals exhibition by the river as they waited for the Science Fair to open only made things worse for her.

"Be patient, Skuld-san," Natsumi casually told her, now in shorts and a fairly modest orange top that covered almost as much as a bellyshirt would, looking at the contents of a huge tank filled with exotic clown fish. "They said they would open in half an hour, right?"

"R-Right!" Skuld played along, forcing a smile. "Don't mind my impatience, it's not that I dislike being here with you or anything..."

"How cute, this is the first time I've seen you being a reverse Tsundere instead of the straight way around," Yuuna snarked teasingly.

Skuld made a face at her. "You aren't even half as funny as you think you are, Yuuna. By the way, Keiichi, who's texting you now?"

"Hmmm?" Keiichi looked up from his cellphone. "Oh, nothing, it's just Megumi telling me they're almost here. Apparently Chihiro-sempai and the guys saw fit to pick two hitchikers up. Dammit, when will they learn? After what happened last time at Nekomi, too...!"

Natsumi blinked. "What happened last-"

He sighed miserably, lowering the phone. "Sorry, but I'd really prefer not to talk about that, especially not to someone your age." Further adding to his discomfort, he caught a glance of another, just arrived text demanding to know why he hadn't taken Skuld aside yet. That older sister, no doubt. As if he didn't have enough problems already...

"Okay..." Natsumi slowly said, feeling even more detached from these people now. Staring into the massive tank again, a detail that had so far escaped her caught her attention. "Um, guys?"

"Yeah?" Yuuna asked, sipping from her can of soda.

"Are clownfish supposed to actually grin, you know... like clowns?"

"Of course not, they're called that just because of their color scheme," Skuld muttered, "Fish can't smile or grin, everyone knows that!"

"Well," Natsumi poked a finger on the surface of the tank, "these are grinning, at least!"

Skuld, Yuuna and Keiichi immediately paused, their eyes growing wider.

A few exhibits away, clad in a very daring and risque leopard print bikini, Urd was too busy keeping her distance from Skuld and helping herself to another can of smuggled-in Ebisu beer to be of any help at all with that sudden foreboding cue...

The skies were crystal clear though, so there was no thunder rumbling anyway.

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **A Dream of Flying.**

Sometimes, Subaru Ryoko dreamed of flying.

It's not just any sort of flight either; otherwise, she'd have fulfilled it long ago joining by Mahora Aeronautics Club. She'd considered it once, during her high school days, but after taking the first few tests, she had passed on the chance to join, despite acing each and every exam she'd been subjected to.

Subaru Ryoko found it just wasn't enough.

In her dreams, she isn't piloting an airplane, she's flying far above Earth itself, past a thin needle of silvery metal stretching from the planet's surface, past the Moon and past Mars' red surface, making her way towards Jupiter in a gloriously huge spaceship, and then a kickass mecha suit shot from the ship, to engage in fierce combat in the void, easily defeating swarms of malevolent adversaries coming her way.

It isn't like Ryoko was a fan of such shows or manga either; she'd watched a few episodes of that Gekigangar giant robot crap at the urgings of her friend Hikaru, and found it to be unbearable trite. Were people that easily entertained in the eighties? No, Ryoko's dream goes beyond that, it's not about vicariously living those experiences through a TV show, it's about living them in the flesh. In her dreams she soars. In her dreams she's truly alive.

Now, the School Festival is on its first day, and the college student idly makes her way through the attractions. Hikaru's busy at her manga circle's exposition, and her only other close friend, Maki, is doing some last minute practice for the musical competition where she'll most likely kill everybody in the audience and the jury seats, with the intent to, in Maki's words, "screw over that Jakuzure bitch so hard she loses her virginity". For once Ryoko is on her own, her hands in her jacket's pockets, idly walking around, avoiding the costumed people filming last-minute scenes for their movies, admiring the CGI, and taking in the colorful sights all around, until she sees the space flight simulator.

She'd tried a few of those things before at the arcades, and they always failed to impress her. Even so, this one was bigger and louder than the others, and the ride was very cheap, so she thought she'd try it out.

The ride was good, very good, the best she's ever tried. It was still far from being as perfect as the dream, but Ryoko didn't hold that against it, because really, what else could? After she's done, she sneaked away, avoided the people having sex in the bushes, puffed on a cigarette, and looked up at the crystal blue sky.

This time, Subaru Ryoko daydreams.

Eventually, the people having sex in the bushes left, creeped out by the girl who was just standing there staring at the sky.

* * *

 **Names to Run Away from…  
**  
"Bwak-bwak-kawwk kawk buckaw," Boo-sensei opined. "Bwh-ack-kak, kak, kak, buckawwk!"

"Oh, there's no doubt about that," the perfectly friendly hooded stranger—really, even adults will cosplay as anything nowadays, Boo told himself—nodded once again, elegantly sipping from his cup of green tea. "Hopefully that will change with the next elections. Mind you, I'm perhaps not the best person to ask, as I've been… sort of busy elsewhere lately, but just by looking at the newspapers, I can't help agreeing with you."

They keep on chatting in the small café at a corner of the Festival under the radiant summer sun while a Magical Patissier cosplayer and a Magical Gorilla cosplayer staged a very elaborate fight scene not far away. You'd have thought it was actually real! "Ba-wak, bwak, kawk, bwak buck-awww. Buck-buck-kawww!"

"Precisely, but I think it's all a matter of adjusting the budgets to the rate of inflation. Honestly, I consider myself sort of a conservative when it comes to such questions, so I don't believe the government should lend massive amounts of aid money unless absolutely necessary. The strength of companies is tested by their capacity to stay afloat on their own during crises, after all. I'm sure we'll come out of this with a strengthened economy. Either that or a lot of people will be leaving shoes on rooftops again."

"Bewrk? Kawk-kawk, kawk, kawk kawk, kek kek kek- Buckawk, bucakww."

"Well, I'm afraid I can't agree on that particular point, but I still understand where you're coming from," the stranger says, primly, almost daintily reaching for his dessert after finishing the drink. Boo couldn't understand that either, he's always had his drinks after the dessert. "Like I told you, I suppose we have different perspectives. You could say I'm too old fashioned because, heh, actually, I'm far older than I look. Or so I've been told, at least!"

"Kwek-kwek be-week?"

"Oh, my name? You can call me Colonel Sanders, sorry, I had forgotten to mention that. It's a pleasure to—"

Now Colonel Sanders sats alone at their formerly shared table, looking in mild perplexity at the door, still swinging back and forth while creaking. For some reason, there are white feathers gently fluttering down all before him and over the table.

"Was it something I said?" he asks the thin air. "And I really wanted to ask him where he got his chicken costume. It would have been just the thing to make Kitty wear… "

* * *

 **A Dream of Declaration.**

"Are you sure you don't want to try?" her mother asked one last time, while the limo pulls before the front gates of the Festival.

The beautiful little girl looks quietly at the busy grounds, bustling with laughter and joy, and occasional random violence as a Magical Police cosplayer did some stunts for a movie. Did they not realize how long editing in that scene was ging to take? Procrastinators. She shook her head while smiling sadly. "Sorry. Maybe next year."

Daidouji Sonomi couldn't believe her daughter's not declaring herself this year either. For all her zeal in her pursuit of romance, for all of her intense and precocious interest, she was still terrified of taking that decisive step.

Now, from an outsider's perspective Tomoyo probably remained, despite all of her quirks, notably better anchored in reality than her mother, at least in what concerned romance and her peers. Sonomi ignores, or pretends to forget, that most ten years-old tend to react unfavorably when another ten years-old their own gender declares undying love for them, and even though Sakura-chan is all loving herself, assuming she actually got the hint about the kind of love expressed, she'd simply be flustered and be unable to give a straight— no pun intended—answer.

Maybe that was what drove Aunt Nadeshiko away from her all those years ago. Tomoyo could only speculate.

They spend a couple hours together for once, hand in hand, visiting a few rides and eating a few things Sonomi would normally never allow herself, before Tomoyo had to rejoin the kids in her class, Sakura being the most enthusiastic of all, of course. Sonomi and her daughter hugged each other, promised to meet again after lunchtime, and off the children went, to be children on their own, but as she waved them away, Sonomi knew that, too, was part of the start of growing up.

Her heart sank for a moment, but then she just turned around, sighing, and headed for the Tree.

She's still in great shape, and reaches the Tree soon enough. Not many have gathered there yet, and this year the surroundings seemed mostly free of the usual, annoying 'cock-blockers' striking from the distance to interrupt the declarations. Sonomi hated those people, whoever they were. Couldn't they allow youngsters to enjoy romance while they still could, before petty considerations like the time of the month and birth control and long-distance dating and college and the job market got in the way? Good to see the staff did something about them this year. Although she sort of wished they'd be more proactive about the students having sex in the bushes. And… shit, was that Nero picking up acorns? God, the rumors were true, Milky Holmes still lived in the school and scavenged food from the woods! Okay, time to sneak away from her old classmate… stealthy, stealthy…

The slim woman made it to an isolated spot, knelt on the grass, carefully placed the lovely framed portrait of Nadeshiko before her, and then said in a whisper, like every other year, the three most important words.

"I love you."

* * *

 **An Anonymous' Story.**

He was a man with a mission.

A mission from his God, from his people. A mission from his brothers.

Five minutes from now, this man will steal a truck from the storage area of the Festival. Another five minutes later, he will crash said truck into the large tree in the middle of the campus, detonating the dirty bomb his group had handed him and killing hundreds of the degenerates gathering at these unholy grounds, full of moral depravity and insolence against God's will.

He took a few good, long glances at the youthful whores passing around him in their shamelessly short skirts and bathing suits and then sped up his pace while shuddering, tightening the collar of his concealing shirt around his neck. As he did so, however, he faileds to notice the way the tall, tanned man standing by a girl who is being groped by two of the worst whores he'd seen so far look at him as if recognizing him.

"Excuse me just a second, Anthy," this man said, leaving his moaning Master to the giggling, perverse attentions of the girl with sandy-blonde wavy hair and her brown-twin-tailed, bespectacled partner in crime. He swiftly, secretively, moved after the stranger in the crowd, tailing him in silence until the other anonymous man reached the lot where they parked the supply trucks.

The soldier of the cause smiles to himself as he forced the truck's door open. Soon they would all see, soon they would pay, and they would fear them, the chosen of God!

Then he felt the huge, ominous presence clad in red and black looming over him just as he was climbing in. The bigger man flashed a sharp instrument of death in each hand like a punishing angel, and then he struck down.

They never found this soldier of the holy cause, this warrior of his faith. The Counter Guardian would be too busy in the days to come to personally deliver his scalp to his comrades, as he'd have wanted to, so they could know fear as well. He supposed their uncertainty about his disappearance, and mostly the bomb's disappearance, would have to suffice.

At least until the bomb was… delivered through a middleman back to them, even if not the way they'd have wanted it.

The Nameless Hero has his ways, after all.


	4. Time Scene Investigation

She materialized on top of a small grassy hill overlooking the lively campus filled with the children of Eve below. Around her pale, delicate form, a snug white garment only covering her torso, leaving her limbs fully exposed, her feet bare.

She didn't question the choice of attire, assuming it was a requirement to fit in with the crowds waiting between Lady Urd and her (or budget cuts again. Damned budget cuts). Without any hesitation, she quickly headed downhill, for she was a woman with a mission. Not from God, but at the very least from a duly accredited representative.

Soon she had reached the outer borders of the bizarre, colorful Festival, where sweaty men and women would wave periodicals and special editions from their stands, loudly announcing them for those willing to purchase.

" _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ The popular brainchild of Akamatsu Ken...! Now prime for a comeback with the arrival of its totally-not-sucky-I-swear sequel to TV...!"

"Negima's done and UQ Holder sucks...! Buy your _Fate Grand Order_ doujin here...! Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon's creation is all the rage now...! The second Swimsuit Event is about to start...! Buy it for Nobu...!"

"Batman, get your Batman stuff here...! DC Comics' creation and trademark is bound for a new big boom with the Justice League movie...! C'mon, Wonder Woman proved they don't have to suck...! Cyborg is totally League material and not just a shameless bid to add a black guy!"

"We make no profit from this! But your support still means a lot for us! Please, Shadow Crystal Mage edits this, how can you let it pass...!? Sure, he hasn't written his own stuff in a while, but he's just working on it!"

She eventually stopped by a small random food stand, asked for a sandwich, and then ran away with it in her mouth as soon as she was asked for money in exchange. She supposed that wasn't a very angelic thing to do, but it was Higher Command's fault for sending her physical form on an empty stomach and not wearing anything with pockets for any sort of Earthly currency. At the very least, her feet and legs were as fast as she needed them to be for her assignment, and hence it took only a short time to leave her enraged pursuer behind.

As she doubled a corner, passing under a large banner that read **You Broke My Heart with Fanservice, Chapter Four: Time Scene Investigation** , she abruptly crashed into someone walking the opposite way.

Dropping on her butt and rubbing her lower back with a slight wince- for it had been a while since the last time she had experienced pain in combat- the girl with short blue hair looked at the idiot who had just walked into her sprint and made her drop her sandwich, and found herself looking into the large brown eyes of a shocked black haired boy, who now also sat on the dust with a tall, 'bountiful' beauty with long purplish hair, a black bikini, and tinted glasses stood behind him, clearly surprised as well.

A passing white dog who kind of looked like an adorable fluffy cat briefly stopped in her frantic escape from her owner, took a look and sniff at the dropped sandwich between the stunned into silence youngsters, then finally eagerly swallowed the dirt-covered snack before running away again.

Menchi would've preferred a piece of toast actually, but this was okay too.

* * *

Even much later, after long and careful examination, Negi still couldn't say what had hit him. Thus he didn't hold it against anyone, even if Chisame and Matoi thought differently (Chamo was all too quick to blame Berserker, probably because he was the only culprit not physically attractive).

It had finished just as chaotically as it had started, when the newcomer brashly challenged Saber to a duel right then and there, not even caring about their enclosed surroundings, or all the uninvolved youngsters present there at the time. "Just run out and don't get in the way!" was all the armored person said before charging at Saber. Shirou, as always, tried to get in the way only to be swiftly pulled back out of harm's way by Negi. Who in turn had immediately tried to get in the way himself, only to be swiftly pulled back out of harm's way by Shirou, Chisame, Satomi and Matoi.

The situation had wrapped up rather quickly after that, no small wonder given where they were, and the nature of the forces involved in the conflict. Especially once Illya had shouted her expected but no less dreaded "Berserker, kill them!" and he had leapt forward with a mighty roar just as one of the walls exploded...

Well, Negi thought through the sleepy daze currently clouding his mind, that would most likely be difficult to explain through the standard excuses. Although his first and foremost concern at the moment, even over that, was of course and like always the safety of his students, Saber included (he was okay with letting a fabled king whose legend was only matched by that of the Thousand Master's- from Negi's perspective, at least- fight her own battles, until the moment said king enrolled herself as his student. The way Negi saw it, from then on she became his responsibility too) so as soon as he was aware of having been knocked out, he forced himself to regain consciousness, making himself sit up on the infirmary's floor...

Much to his relief, the first thing he saw was Chisame's healthy and concerned face as she sighed heavily. "Thank God, you're okay after all," she said.

"Y-Yeah," Negi smiled, his relief growing when he saw Satomi crouched at his other side, apparently none the worse for wear either. "How long was I...?"

Now scowling bitterly, Chisame held a broken golden watch before his face, holding it by the chain from where hung a shattered mess of barely strung together pieces. Negi flinched as she asked him coldly, "What is this, and why didn't you told us about it?"

Negi gulped, feeling around in his trunks only to notice the area where his right pocket had been had a large burn mark on the side over the swollen lump where he'd been hit by the armored knight... or had it been a casual graze from Berserker? Probably not the latter, as he didn't feel like his hip had been turned into pulverized glass, the pain was not THAT bad...

"N-Now, Chisame," Negi nervously said, "it's true I neglected mentioning Chao-san gave me that gift a week ago, but I don't think we should be focusing on that when Saber-san and Emiya-san..."

"We are well, thanks for your concern," Saber said from where she also sat on the floor, between a sighing Shirou and a grumbling and embittered Knight in Red, "but I do think that device is indeed of great importance right now, Professor. Especially after listening to what Mr. Chamo had to say during your bout of unconsciousness." She calmly held up a fist, Chamo caught tightly in it with bulging eyes and a purple face, making a chain of short choked sounds.

"Chamo..." Negi sighed sadly, shoulders drooping. Then he grew agitated again. "Still! I know Chao-san made several claims about the nature of the watch, but those are unproven yet! I mean, it's not like I'm doubting her word, but it's entirely possible she merely misunderstood the capacity of her untested artifact to-!"

"Actually," Illya said from where she sat on Berserker's wide left shoulder, her legs swinging back and forth playfully, "I'd say that student of yours really was capable of everything your familiar said she claimed being capable of, little brother!"

Negi blinked. "Huh? Illya-san! I'm surprised, you never seemed to give my students any credit before, and to hear you say this when you don't even know Chao-san yet..."

"She doesn't have to, she has just seen what this stupid thing caused when these idiots broke it!" Chisame growled. "Because it can't be a coincidence everything froze as soon as they hit you and broke this damn gizmo to pieces!"

"What are you talking about, Chisame?" the teacher blinked, looking around in all directions, then seeing Ako miserably sweeping pieces of broken furniture with a silently dutiful Sayoko's help. Past his initial relief to see Izumi was fine as well, however, he paused and gasped in horror when he looked out, through the large hole in the wall, and saw the crowds outside frozen in place like so many mannequins, birds suspended in the air above them, and the flags and banners paralyzed in the middle of a breeze that also had grown stunted into inactivity over the last few minutes. "Oh dear, what...!"

Then, however, something else in the room stirred and came back to life, as the mysterious knight's Master yawned, sat up on his bed, and opened his eyes while rubbing them with the back of his hand. "God, not again, at least Fou isn't licking me this- Oh, Mordred!" he casually tilted his head aside, causing Shirou to suddenly break into a choking fit. "Nice to see you by my bedside, but where's everyone else, and what just happened? Last thing I can remember, we were-"

With a low, rough sigh, the Knight of Treachery lazily waved a gauntlet. "What's up, Master. Let's just say things probably aren't moving as much as you'd expect them to right now."

* * *

Sitting somewhere else in the Festival, Akagi Ritsuko frowned at the large tropical smoothie she had ordered for herself at a cafe, then looked across the table, where Katsuragi Misato remained sitting in an all too atypical state of complete lack of motion, still sporting the same laugh from when she'd been telling Ritsuko about this kid who'd moved in with her, Kyoko and Asuka recently, and how cutely and easily flustered he was...

Ritsuko supposed she would have to go kick someone's ass very hard for this soon. Most likely Lingshen's, but then again, she had actually been kind of hoping for that chance for a while now.

Before that, however, she had to take this one chance to do something she always had wanted, but never gotten to do, ever before.

So after finishing with her own smoothie, she quickly took Misato's and began digging in.

Finally getting one, even a small one, over her! Maybe she would actually thank Lingshen after being done kicking her ass...

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

After a lot of waiting, Kagurazaka Asuna lifted the white bedsheet off herself, looked through the almost absolute darkness in all directions, and then sighed, heading for the door.

"Hey, Iinchou," she said, peeking in the next room, where a Yukihiro Ayaka elegantly clad as a classic Gothic vampire temptress (the kind who dressed far less scandalously than Evangeline, yet retaining an unmistakable sense of sensuality) stood. "Are you stopping people coming my way?"

Asuna frowned when Ayaka failed to answer or even acknowledge her question. "Heyyyyy, I'm talking to you blondie!" the redhead said, walking up to her blonde rival and poking her in a shoulder. "I'm talking to you, don't start ignoring me for no reason, it's not like I'm an actual ghost! If you still think I'm being too hard on the customers, just say so...!"

Despite Asuna's initial concerns and even offense they had stuck her with a simple role as a crappy bedsheet spirit in a plain dusty room while everyone else hosted elaborate rooms with intricate attractions, for some reason it had worked far better than she had expected. Asuna had to guess often the classics did work better than anything else after all.

What wasn't working now was Iinchou as she stood as still as a mannequin. As a matter of fact Asuna at first thought someone HAD replaced Ayaka with a lifelike replica, since she wasn't even breathing, but she felt too lifelike to her touch (expressed through roughly pinching and pulling on the heiress' cheeks) and Asuna grew convinced that was the real Ayaka, just... frozen solid but not icy at all, if that made sense. On the one hand she was far more bearable that way, but on the other Asuna really, really, REALLY hoped she wasn't dead. N-not that she cared about her or anything! But it would really put a damper on the festival if the haunted house ended up with _another_ dead body, hmph!

"Hey! Haruna!" Asuna called into the next room. "I think something's very wrong with Iinchou, maybe she needs a medic, and I'm not talking about Konoka, this is no injury but- Oh," she quietly finished, seeing a just as paralyzed Mermaid Haruna holding a cellphone to her face, her expression urgent and yet still perfectly motionless, caught in the middle of a sentence no doubt spoken with strange gravity for Paru. "So it's gotten to you too, huh..."

Sighing and shaking her head, Asuna went through the rest of the house, checking on every room and attraction, and noticing not only were all of her classmates and Itoshiki-sensei, and even the damn Ghost Cat and the visitors, had been paralyzed for some reason or another, but even the animatronics had stopped functioning, perfectly silent and motionless.

"What the hell, seriously!" the exasperated Kagurazaka complained, stomping back to Ayaka's side, and then pulling out a black marker and her own Pactio card at the same time. With her right hand she began doodling on Ayaka's beautiful face as she held the card against Asuna's own forehead with the left. "Hello? Brat? It's me. Yeah, yeah, nice to hear you as well... because you've gotta lot of explaining to do! This is about Chao's stupid time manipulating watch I warned you about, isn't it?! Of course I figured it out almost instantly, I'm Baka only when it comes to books! While you're apparently the other way around, YOU MORON!"

Asuna listened, hummed, and then growled, "No, I'm not writing on Iinchou's face, why would I do something as stupid as that?! Don't try to switch the subject around, okay?! Everyone here but me is like a statue now, what do you intend to do about that, mister?!"

Seriously, writing on someone's face? Why to do that when drawing was much more effective at doing the job? What an amateur that kid was!

* * *

A convenient scene transition later, Asuna, now in the navy blue one piece she had been wearing under her bedsheet, appeared before those assembled in the infirmary as Negi summoned her to his side. "Okay!" the bells-sporting girl said, already waving her harisen around, "Just tell what I can- Wah!" she recoiled after noticing Berserker's titanic presence, the monstrous Servant grunting at her with gruff disdain while Illya chuckled, patting him on an arm. "What the hell, guys, what are you doing here with THEM?! And, um, those two are...?"

Negi sighed and gestured towards the armored figure quietly seething next to a freakishly ordinary boy who was wrapped up in an intense conversation with Shirou, the Emiya youngster only growing more and more confused as the exchange went on. "Asuna, please meet Saber-san, Saber-san's son."

Asuna stared, bewildered, at the fellow in Medieval cosplay, except because now she was too knowledgeable to think of them in that once all too immediate and comforting assumption. Then she looked at Saber, and told her, "Well, congratulations on being the first from our class to have a child!"

"Ahem!" Satomi coughed pointedly.

"Hakase, being a teenaged mom is NOT something to be proud of," Chisame said.

"A class?" the knight huffed grumpily. "That is, is she talking, not about our Class, but-?"

"About my classroom, _our_ classroom," her father nodded stoically. "I'm one of the students under Professor Negi's tutelage right now."

The knight stared coldly at Negi before just as coldly telling Shirou's Saber, "I know you've somehow always had a thing for studying under mages despite being no mage yourself, but isn't this too much of a downgrade from your prior teacher? Where is your fabled pride now, King of Knights?! Serving a clearly inferior Master, wasting your time in a classroom for teenaged airheads, not winning the local Grail War yet...!"

"Hey, now," Chisame mumbled, "don't start throwing generalizations like that around. We aren't all airheads in the classroom, ten of us do have something in our skulls..."

Satomi blinked. "Which ones?"

Chisame grumbled under her breath. "You, Yotsuba, Lingshen, Tatsumiya, Ookuchi, Ayase, Miyazaki, Karakuri, Evangeline and I, of course."

"Awwww, Chisame, you do care!" Satomi smiled, lightly punching her roommate in the arm while Matoi rolled her eyes.

"Well, your skull's contents may be scrambled, but I can't deny they're there, at least!" Chisame clarified.

"... why am I lumped in with the likes of Asuna-san?!" a distraught Ako gasped.

"Yeah, why is she?" Asuna asked, being used enough to being branded a Baka the insult to her own intelligence just rolled off her like that.

"What kind of person with a crippling phobia of blood picks a career involving treating bloody injuries?" Chisame bluntly asked back. Before Ako could defend her case, however, Saber spoke to Mordred, as evenly as before.

"The Grail War is a work in process, a war must be won through steady and often slow, patient work, as soon as you have considered all factors involved," she said. "If you still ignore that, you remain as unfit to rule as you were back then."

"Oooohhh, there you go again!" Mordred made in a clearly threatening gesture. "You excuse inaction through flimsy excuses because you have lost your nerve, old man! In the time you have spent here doing nothing, I have already cleared half a dozen bloody campaigns in different worlds!"

"Mordred!" Ritsuka suddenly called out, while gesturing at Shirou to wait a moment for his next answer. "It's not like you won all those campaigns on your own, you know!"

"Well, I will admit you helped a bit here and there as well, Master, but-"

"And what about everyone else?" the boy interrupted.

Not that Mordred gave signs of acknowledging the interruption at all. "- through the whole war against the Grand Caster, I've been the first and foremost warrior, and I refuse to knowledge the others as my superiors in the field of combat! I even hope they're paralyzed forever now! That way I'll win this War on my own easily, as they won't be getting in my way!"

"Mordred..." Ritsuka said.

"Well, fine, _our_ way, Master!"

"That's not what I meant either!"

Asuna looked at Saber again. "Sorry for telling you this, but you did an awful job raising this, uh, kid."

"I didn't raise him," Saber admitted, "that was his mother."

"Well, I guess that explains a lot then," Asuna shrugged.

"Is it just me, or are the dads of everyone in this room really bad at parenting?" Chisame said blandly.

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" Illya, Shirou, Negi and Mordred all yelled.

Papacons, represented!

"Okay," Asuna asked next, "and what's with you guys anyway? You're here to win the Grail War too, I guess, did they already tell you the Grail's like cursed with all the world's evils or some crap like that?"

"Again with that," Illya muttered, looking aside. "As if my family had really been stupid enough as to-"

"Yes, they would," Chisame, Matoi, Satomi and Asuna all chorused, clearly remembering a certain archer girl.

"Actually," Ritsuka cut in, "we aren't here to defeat any of you, we're here to help save your world. You see, this might be very difficult concept to accept, but... we come from another dimension..."

"Ah," Negi simply said.

"Well, I suppose that explains why there could be two Sabers in the same War," Satomi said.

"Go on, then," Chisame said.

Ritsuka and Mordred grew very agitated. "Wh-What's with that calm reaction, didn't you morons understand what we just told you?! We come from a different world! A different place apart from this one! We aren't from here at all!"

"Oh, it's not even the first time this has happens to us," Matoi reassured them. "We got visits from another dimension like a month or so ago. Sometimes it feels like it's been years, though..."

"Yes, they even were our own alternate dimension counterparts," Negi reminisced. "So don't worry, we aren't going to reject your explanations that easily, we are understanding..."

Chamo chuckled. "Yeah, for Ala Alba, band of adventurers supreme, trifles like these are nothing but ordinary, almost everyday bumps in our illustrious path to glory!"

"Don't say it's ordinary!" Hasegawa screeched. "No matter how many times they happen, these things can't ever be ordinary, damn you!"

 _Since she couldn't move, somewhere Hitou Nami was made due to sneeze._

Mordred looked at her Master. "Are we sure Fou can't talk? Because this one talks..."

Ritsuka coughed. "Wh-Why would he talk? If he could he'd already done it, don't you think? A-Anyway, I'm Fujimaru Ritsuka, Magus for the Chaldea Organization, and this is one of my Saber Servants, Mordred-san, but you already knew-"

"One of your Sabers?" Satomi dubiously repeated.

"And why are you saying his real name around that freely anyway?" Chisame said. "I thought you were supposed to keep that info a secret, even from your closest allies?"

"See, that is part of why he's always been too careless to be worthy of seizing the throne," Shirou's Saber calmly said.

Mordred growled ferally. "Shut up, I'm not careless at all! I'm the best administrator you ever had!"

"That is true, but then again that was not a very high bar to surpass. You all filled me with pride, but I never gathered a staff of high performance bureaucrats in macro management, exactly. Maybe I should have added a few of those into our ranks..."

"Rrrgggh!" Mordred roared.

Ritsuka sighed, while Shirou helpfully handed him a glass of water and an aspirin, from one Master of Saber to a kindred soul. "Thank you... Emiya-san, right? Huh, just like... never mind. Anyway, I pretty much have to call my Sabers by their birth names since I have several of each Class but Shielder, so it'd be very confusing if I-"

"Wait wait wait, how many Servants do you have in the first place?!" Shirou demanded.

"Well," Ritsuka said, "other than Mordred, I arrived with Queen Marie Antoinette, Sasaki Kojiro, Diarmuid of the Love Spot, Tamamo-no-Mae, Kiyohime-san, Edward Teach the Dread Pirate Blackbeard, Lady Scathatch, Karna, King Beowulf, Mary Read and Ann Bonnie, and-"

"Okay, no, sorry, but no! I could believe anything else you said until now, but not this!" Shirou interrupted vehemently. "Tohsaka was very clear it was nearly impossible for a Master to support two Servants at once, are you seriously telling me you have more than a dozen?!"

Ritsuka looked at him helplessly, then squeaked out a weak, "Y-Yes...? It's apparently the only thing I'm good at as a Magus. I know that as talents go, it's kind of underwhelming and only good if you happen to be the master of several Servants. I guess it could be worse, I could be a talentless magus who's only good at Reinforcement or something…"

"There's nothing wrong with only being good at Reinforcement!" Shirou pouted.

"Diarmuid, then?" Shirou's Saber mused aloud. "How interesting. Would you count Iskandar the Great among your ranks?"

"Well, no," Ritsuka admitted.

Shirou sighed. "So you missed at least one, good!"

"He's one of the Servants of my sister, though," Ritsuka added.

"You sister has a gazillion Servants too?!" Illya screamed.

Mordred chuckled. "It's hardly our fault if your paltry Magi can only support a single Servant at a time!"

Illya's right eyebrow twitched dangerously. "S-So what either way? Even if you have that many, Heracles would still beat them all on his own! And you're the only one who can act to shield your stupid Master right now anyway!"

"We know, we know, please stay calm!" Ritsuka mediated while Mordred huffed. He still could remember all the trouble another Heracles had given his team at Okeanos, the last thing he wanted was a repeat of that but with only one Servant by his side and no Ark of the Covenant. "Like we said, we aren't here to antagonize any of you. And of course we believe your Grail might be corrupted. I've seen what an unleashed contaminated Grail can do to a world..."

"Do tell us, then," Shirou's Saber requested, before anyone could raise the question on how came her son was named Mordred, and what did that say about her own identity. She knew it would happen sooner or later either way, but she still wanted to stall it as long as possible. "And could this strange event that just happened have something to do with it?"

"I don't think so, that time, well, time itself wasn't stopped," Ritsuka said. "But everything else that could go wrong, went wrong. It happened during our first outing into a Singularity, before we even met Mordred..."

* * *

 _Back Then:_

"Base sequences confirmed to be human genomes. Spiritual Vessels' attributes confirmed to be Lawful Good, bordering on Stupid Good, and Chaotic Ev-"

Ritsuko glared at the entrance.

"- and Lawful Good," the recorded voice immediately corrected itself.

The recorded voice was fittingly soothing and easing, lulling, even. Definitely feminine as well, something that made Fujimaru Ritsuka reflect on a few things about human nature, and how we almost always are more willing to expect acceptance and support from women, and attempted dominion if not outright hostility from men. Of course, his sister was an exception to that rule, in that few came to expect anything from subjugation from her once they got to know her well, but then his sister was an exception on many things.

Of course, Ritsuka wasn't the kind to normally think too deeply about complex issues not directly related to the fairly unremarkable so far developments of his everyday life (a cynic would say he didn't think at all), and he was fairly old fashioned in several gender related issues despite of his youth, so he quickly pushed those thoughts aside and continued listening to the voice of the machine reading their data. After all, he had also been educated to respect and pay attention to his elders and authority figures, even programmed ones. In short, Ritsuka was a perfectly boring main character type, of the sort to be found in one episode-only OVA specials because it's not really about him, he's just an audience avatar to walk around showcasing the hot girls.

Ritsuko, while holding herself to the same everyday standards and actually believing she stuck to them reasonably well, was a more complicated case, the kind of person who easily passes for a perfectly boring main character type at first but, as she grows confident and relaxed around you, unconsciously sinks her claws into you until drawing blood out and becoming the sort of character to be found in sadistic gag manga instead. For now, however, she just stood there smiling in a perfectly pleasant way, although her right foot already had started softly tapping down without her noticing.

"Welcome to the museum of humanity's future. This is the Human Continuation Facility, Chaldea."

Instinctively, they acknowledged the welcome with matching humble nods, despite immediately realizing how silly that was. Even so, they might be filming that with some sort of hidden camera, so Ritsuka guessed it wouldn't hurt to show as much politeness as possible either way. This sort of hyper-self-conscious paranoia should clue you in on the type of person he was.

"Fingerprint authentications, vocal authentications, and genetic authentications all clear. Magic Circuit measurements… Completed."

The voice spoke in a somewhat stiff and not that smooth Japanese. Obviously Nihongo hadn't been the original speaker's first language. Ritsuka supposed he understood the reasons behind it, since the facilities had been built by Westerners after all, but the prevalent traditionalist Japanese part in him still wondered why they couldn't have hired a native to record the greetings for the locals of the islands.

"Registered names match. You have been acknowledged as members of the primates."

Here Ritsuka frowned a little. Had that been a mistake in translation, or had they just called him a monkey...?

As usual, Ritsuko spoke on the subject far before he would. "Hey, what was that you just said?" she asked for the benefit of whoever was recording this, for she was a little hyper-self-conscious paranoid in her own way. "You said primate, as in-?"

"Pleased to meet you. You are today's last visitors."

The front gates opened for them, and the tall, dark haired young man and her grumbling, shorter, orange haired sister walked in, their black bags slung over their shoulders, their long overcoats and scarves tightly pressed around them, the better to protect them from the wild icy winds blowing from the merciless outdoors. As the door closed hermetically behind them with nothing but the smallest click, the recording said a few last words before turning itself off, leaving the wide and strangely empty greeting hall in a perfect silence.

"Please have a good time here..."

* * *

"Fouh…?" someone asked through the darkness. "Kyu…Kyu?"

Ritsuka woke up neither too slow nor too quickly, and yet his eyelids still felt too heavy as to be fully lifted. Through the haze in his half-open eyes, he only could get glimpses of something very white and fluffy looking.

"Fouh!" the voice repeated. "Fuu, Fouh!"

Was that the cry of some animal? It didn't sound like any animal Ritsuka knew. Besides, it kinda felt like his cheek was being licked just now. Something warm, wet and raspy ran all over it at the moment, that much was certain, and Ritsuka, who never had owned a cat or dog, couldn't help feeling slightly grossed out by it…

Chaldea's visitor finally could open his eyes all the way, and through the dissipating haze, past the small and fuzzy white quadrupedal, he found a girl standing in front of him, conversing with Ritsuko about something he couldn't hear coherently just yet as he woke up.

She was a dutiful looking beauty with glasses and light short hair, which fell in bangs that hid most of her cute rather than gorgeous pale face. She wore a simply gray ensemble fitting the lowly intern of a large corporation, complete with a long skirt, a long open jacket over her blouse, and ugly black shoes.

He could also see up both their skirts, but it was probably not a good idea to mention that. Though he'd have to chide his sister for not wearing panties again.

"Um, ah, hello!" the unknown girl said after a few moments of uneasy silence, "it's neither morning nor night time, so please wake up, Sempai. Your sister said... she just said..."

"Who are you?" he asked, sitting up on the hard, cold… floor? that had been under him right then for some reason. That was, of course it was logical to have the floor under you, but not so much when you realize you had been sleeping directly on it.

"That's a hard question right off the bat, so I'll pass on answering. I'm not someone whose name is worth mentioning—-I guess?" the girl said even more awkwardly, making a point of looking aside as much as she could without changing her position.

And Ritsuka frowned, blandly as was his custom. "Is that some sort of joke?" he tried to guess.

"Well," Ritsuko said, with a fist on her own hip, "that wouldn't shock me, this place seems to have its own sort of strange humor about it. No wonder it was built by Europeans..."

"N-No!" the girl with glasses protested, suddenly growing very flustered and agitated. Even for Ritsuka, a complete stranger with no particular mental prowess (no, no obvious joke, it's too easy), it was already blatantly obvious this girl didn't have much in the way of social experience. "N-No, I do have a name! I do have a proper name, really! B-But I've rarely had the chance to use it… So like, I can't really make an impressive self-introduction or something…"

As the boy rose from the floor with his sister's help, dusting his pants off and causing the tiny animal to back away from him, he sighed. "It can't be any worse than mine, I suppose. I mean, I'm introducing myself to you while lying on the floor, how sad is that? What's the deal with that anyway, did I faint? I don't remember…"

"Must be the height, Oniichan," Ritsuko said inocently, "I heard that often happens to people when they go way up into the mountains. I feel just fine myself, but then you always were the sickly one. It most certainly can't be because you ate poisoned udon dough I put in my lunchbox in case someone stole my food. Nope, it can't possibly be that." She smiled brightly.

Ritsuka looked sideways. "Y-Yes, it can't possibly be that at all."

The other girl blinked, not getting it. "Don't you remember falling asleep, Sempai? Oh oh dear, that might be bad. I just arrived, and you were already there, with your sister at your side holding a black pen, and she had no idea why you'd just dropped to rest on the corridor either. M-Maybe we should take you to Doctor Roman? Oh, that's right, you must be part of the newcomers, so you don't know him yet, do you?"

"Nope, not at all," Ritsuko confirmed. "Is he supposed to be important around here?"

"Fouh!" the critter at her feet protested energetically. "Kyu, Kyuu—!"

"Ah, I forgot!" the weird girl blinked. "We haven't introduced you to Fou yet either, have we?"

"… what's with this 'we' business?" Ritsuko asked, giving her an intent look. "Are you British royalty?"

"This squirrel-like colleague is Fou," the girl said quite seriously, picking the Fou up and holding it before the twins' faces. "He's a Very Important Creature that freely strolls through the halls of Chaldea. He called me here, where I found you resting."

"Would you stop calling fainting spells 'resting', please?" Ritsuka asked.

"Ah? But it's most definitely resting, Oniichan, else it would be 'poisoning' because you must have eaten my poisoned udon dough that I left as a trap in my lunchbox." Ritsuko said, her tone slipping another tiny bit down the ladder Ritsuka knew all too well, and thus dreaded.

"I was resting! Definitely resting, I don't know why I would say otherwise!"

Anyway, it, or he if the girl was to be believed, was an incredibly adorable creature, no larger than a bunny, with big baby blue eyes and completely white, soft looking fur covering all of his body. His ears were as long as a rabbit's, but his tail looked more like an Angora cat's. Ritsuka didn't think he really looked like a squirrel, but to each their own.

"Fouh," the little beast nodded. "Nkyu, fou!"

And then he jumped from the beauty's hands, and ran off down the corridor until he disappeared behind a corner, because the Fujimarus' day hadn't been balls weird enough yet. No, it had just been the normal amount of weird so far.

"He's run off somewhere again," sighed the meganekko, also proving she not only was pretty, but also a Master of the Obvious. "He's always going wherever he pleases."

"That's an animal I've never seen before," the young man commented. "From Australia, isn't it?"

"I wouldn't know, I'm not well-versed in Zoology," she admitted. "But I guess it's possible. Australian animals are normally very elusive or aggressive, right? And Fou doesn't approach anyone but me. But he seems to have gotten a liking for you, Sempai! Congratulations, now you are Fou's second attendant!"

"Hey, why couldn't he have taken a liking to her instead?" Ritsuka protested, pointing at his sibling.

"I don't know, it looked to me like he was escaping from me," Ritsuko mused pensively. "Why he would do that, I'm not sure at all, but you always were better with animals, Oniichan, I think she's right and you should take care of him..."

Before the boy could protest he hadn't sighed up for that (although he wasn't sure yet what he had signed for), another, deeper, far more masculine voice spoke up. "Ah, so you were here, Mashu. That's no good, you have to make sure you get permission before you go any—Oops, looks like there was someone here already,"

The newly arrived man paused, and Ritsuka could see he was very tall. He also was easily two decades older than the teenagers, although still gifted with a certain old fashioned joviality, matching his somewhat outdated and outlandish taste in clothes. Even his hair was somewhat extravagant, to say the least, falling by his shoulders into what looked like his dark red sideburns had grown out of control devouring the sides of his face.

"AH!" Ritsuko cried. "A demonic Abraham Lincoln has appeared!"

"Yes, I get that a lot," the adult said. "You're… I see, you're two of the newbies assigned here today, aren't you? My name's Lev Reinol. I'm one of the technicians working here. And you are…?"

"Fujimaru Ritsuka, sir!" the boy said, quickly looking into one of his pockets and showing him his brand new ID card.

"And Fujimaru Ritsuko, Mr. Demonic President!" the girl said, quickly copying his gesture in a pretty much identical way, to the point you could be excused for believing their personalities were indeed absolutely exchangeable.

The man narrowed his eyes slightly, giving the cards a good close look. He smiled again. "So you are! No prestigious name, so I take it you're two of the ten amateurs? Welcome to Chaldea, children."

Ritsuka gulped while pocketing the card back, the girl with glasses looking up and down at him curiously. "Th-Thanks. We've been told we'll need serious training on this whole magic thing since we don't have any background with it, so—"

Lev laughed, patting him on a shoulder. "Don't worry about that, we'll handle your training, you only have to be receptive to it! But you know, a lot of your fellow students, from the gifted magus families, I must warn you, they're going to make things difficult for you if you aren't careful."

The shy looking girl, who knew a lot on the subject from personal experience, only could lower her head in sorrowful silence.

"C-Careful, Sir?" the younger man gulped.

Lev nodded, losing his smile. "But don't let their words get to you, children. Please don't be pessimistic just because you got normal slots. The upcoming mission needs all forty eight of you."

"Forty eight!" the Fujimaru female gasped.

Lev blinked. "You didn't even know that? My, they just picked you off the street, didn't they? Well, make sure to pay a lot of attention to the Director's speech, then. But don't ask her anything, she hates it when beginners do that. If you have anything you need help with, please feel free to ask either Mashu or—" Here he stopped himself again, and looked at the quiet girl. "Actually, why were you talking to them, Mashu? That really isn't like you. Were you acquainted with them previously?"

She shook her head. "No, this is the first time we've ever met. But, I truly felt no threat from him. In other words, he seems to have no hostile motives whatsoever!"

Ritsuko now was glaring at Mashu.

"- and she doesn't at all either, of course!" Mashu hastily added, smiling very nervously in Ritsuko's way, until the orange haired one regained her beautiful smile herself.

Ritsuka blinked. "Is being like that something special around here?" he asked, growing more concerned by the moment.

Lev hummed, studying his boyish face carefully. "Yes, I see what you mean, Mashu, he certainly has the look of the sedate Japanese herbivore pat down. Why, they could make a dating game around this innocent looking soul, ho ho! Don't take that as an insult, though, Ritsuka-kun. A lot of people who come into Chaldea are pretty fishy, so it's nice to meet someone who comes along as clean as a babe in the proverbial woods!"

"I'm that way as well, you know," Ritsuko said in a tone that regardless held the seeds of great frustration.

"Thanks... I think..." Ritsuka said. "Hm, he said your name was Mashu, right?" he asked the girl then.

She nodded bashfully. "Mashu Kyrielight, to be precise. Sorry to stall with it for so long, Sempai, but— but—"

Then a loud voice blared through the speakers of the gigantic, seemingly mostly deserted so far complex. "Pay attention! This is a matter of capital importance! The initial briefing for all aspiring Masters will start in five minutes in the central control room! Anyone failing to attend will be immediately suspended from the program!"

Lev sighed. "As strict as ever, that girl... Ritsuka-kun, Ritsuko-kun! Hurry up, the briefing's set to take place straight at the end of this corridor! Hurry up and you'll get there in time!"

Ritsuka blinked. "Eh? Why the rush? That's a meeting for aspiring Masters, whatever that is, isn't it?"

Mashu and Lev froze, stared at the Fujimaru boy blankly, and then chorused, "You are aspiring Masters."

"I am?!" he gasped as his twin facepalmed in silence.

"What, what did you think you were going to be here, boy?!" the adult demanded, growing almost really agitated.

"... an intern over summer holiday?" he meekly guessed. Then he added. "With magic? Like a magical waiter or butler for magi?"

"A cute magical meido in a frilly costume serving tea and casting spells to make omurice taste better," Ritsuko confirmed. "And then, in an isolated corner, the master, overcome with lust for my sexy body, pushes me against the wall and– "

Ritsuka, with the ease of long practice, smacked the side of his hand on top of his sister's head to reset her thinking.

"A cute magical meido in a frilly costume serving tea and casting spells to make omurice taste better," Ritsuko reset. "Fighting the forces of evil with the power of magic and maidness! But mostly maidness!"

Ritsuka decided to let that stand.

"You thought of taking summer jobs... in a building complex set in the snowy mountains?" Mashu wondered aloud.

"... I'm not that much of a beach and heat fan, actually?" he blandly offered this time. "And Sis likes any location as long as it's exotic and expensive enough..."

"And as long as it has people attractive enough, yeah," Ritsuko had to admit with a nod. "What?" she preemptively asked the adult. "I'm at the age of dating! I should start around now or I'll end up a Cake, won't I?"

Mashu and Lev looked at each other and shared a long suffering sigh.

* * *

 _Right now:_

"Okay, and what happened next?" Chisame asked.

"Well, Sis and I were subjected to intensive magical training along with all the other recruits," Ritsuka recalled, "but neither of us had any real skills at magic. Director Olga Marie and our instructors were furious, and they were talking about kicking us out. I didn't care much one way or another, but Ritsuko, I could tell, had started to put her heart into it, and I felt bad for her..."

"Shouldn't we be looking for a solution to our current problem instead?" complained Shirou, who was more of a man of action.

"Yeah, I agree," Ako nodded. "I'm not thrilled with the idea of spending the rest of my life in a world of statues, you know?"

"Eh, we've literally got all the time in the world to address that, might as well steamroll through the infodumps already first," shrugged Matoi, who actually didn't give much of a crap as long as Chisame and Negi were okay and mobile. "Continue, Whitebread-san."

Ritsuka sighed. "Right, so that changed relatively soon, after that one time I fell asleep during one of the Director's lectures..."

* * *

 _Back then:_

Mashu frowned. "You fell randomly asleep again, Sempai? Are you some sort of narcoleptic?"

Ritsuka blinked. "What? Ew, no! I'm not the kind of guy who wants to have sex with corpses! That's disgusting… and I was asleep at the time!" Had Ritsuko slipped him something? _She_ had managed to say awake, and had treacherously pretended not to know him as he'd been ejected from the room.

Mashu sighed. She had never stepped out those facilities during her whole life, and yet she was more aware of how the world worked than this boy? What a depressing thought. "Never mind. They won't let you back in, so I might as well just take you back to your room. Just wait there while I call Doctor Roman so he can give you a checkup..."

"Hm, no, thanks, I'm fine, for real," the boy said, following her down the corridor. "It's just this morning's practice was long and hard, nothing else. I really got reamed hard this morning. It was kind of a pain in the ass."

Mashu gave him a look. Did he not hear the words that were coming out of his mouth? "Nonsense, you'd better rest and let us look after your health," she said as they entered one of several identical rooms after turning a few corners. It was wider than the one at his house, very clean and well lit, too. There was little in the way of any furniture but a bed of white sheets, a locker and a nightstand, however. "I'll go see if I can find the Doctor, but keep in mind that could take a while, he's, ah, a bit, I mean, hm, uh, see you later, Sempai," she said before quickly retreating and awkwardly closed the door after herself.

Ritsuka stood there blinking until he heard another voice from behind him, causing him to yelp in surprise.

"Can you believe that girl?" asked a tall, thin young man with light brown hair, which was long but conveniently kept tied back into a thick ponytail, standing up from behind Ritsuka's bed, where he had been sitting eating Pocky. He still had the box in hand and leftovers in his mouth. "Talking about me as if I were unreliable or something..."

"Wh-Who are you?!" Ritsuka asked, showing some actual emotion at last.

The stranger replied, apparently picking up the tab of acting with randomly paced complete lack of touch with the situation, although with more of an interesting quirkiness to it. "What do you mean by that? No matter where and how you look at it, I'm obviously a doctor! The head of the medical division, Romani Akkiman, to be more precise. For some reason everyone just calls me Dr. Roman, though. I guess you'll do it to, huh, huh?"

Ritsuka gulped. "W-Well, if you don't like it, I won't..."

"Not like it? When have I said I didn't like it?" the man argued. "Roman has a nice ring to it. Somehow it's got this sort of sweet, cool, careless feeling, like a busty girl who wants you to see her panties."

"Um, okay, sure thing, if you say so."

"Sure I do, it's my name and it's cool. So, what's yours?"

"Ah, I'm Player, I mean, I'm Gudao, sorry, I'm Fujimaru Ritsuka, sorry, I don't know what's happening to me today!"

"Huh, then maybe you should see a doctor. I know a few good ones." Then he laughed. "Sorry, sorry! That was some medical humor, you know? You look fairly healthy to me. A Master candidate, I remember your profile now. I think Doctor Mashirito was assigned to you?"

The younger male nodded.

"Right. Sorry I couldn't take your checkups and your sister's myself, but the Director wanted to keep me on the top performance recruits. Um, no offense. I don't keep categories, myself, that's her call. Then what are you doing here, instead of being at the meeting?" the specialist asked curiously.

Ritsuka chuckled bashfully. "Well, I think I fell asleep during her speech, and she—"

"Don't say any more," the Doctor gestured with a hand. "That's the Director, all right. In that case, you're just like me. To be honest, the chief's always scolding me too. More often than not about nonsense accusations, like me sneaking away to go slack off at other people's rooms, can you believe that?" he shook his head before munching on another stick of Pocky, then offering Ritsuka another. "Sorry, where are my manners?"

"Um, thank you," the sweatdropping boy nodded, accepting the Pocky.

"Well," Roman sighed, "if she doesn't outright boot you off, you'll have to ask for a recording of the speech, that's actually important stuff for all candidate Masters to learn. You know the Leyshift experiments are starting soon, right? You can't go into one of those without the proper preparation, especially with your stats and performance record, that'd be just plain suicidal..."

"Leyshift experiments?" Ritsuka echoed. "What is a—"

And then there was a thundering, deafening boom, filling the air and greatly hurting his ears, which felt as if they were being pierced by piping hot needles. Not to mention the whole floor under them shook and quaked, and he lost all footing and dropped, losing consciousness for a moment as his head hit the tiles.

He was starting to wonder for real whether he'd spent most of his time at that place conscious or not...

"Ritsuka-kun," Dr. Roman said, lightly slapping the unconscious boy's cheeks. No, not **those** ones, you sickos. The ones on his ass. "I must warn you, I'm well aware how... delicate my physical appearance is, but I'm still fully heterosexual and I won't be giving you mouth-to-mouth. Since you don't need it anyway. So you'd better wake up on your own."

"Ooohhhh..." Ritsuka woke up slowly, muttering and putting a hand to his aching head. Whether he conveniently woke up on his own at that exact moment or if the doctor's words had anything to do with it will be an exercise left to each particular reader, or listener in the case of Ritsuka's Mahora audience. As it was, Ako, Shirou and Chisame already were exchanging somewhat cynical glances when they heard about it. "Wh-Where am I, no, rather, what hap-"

Gently helping him back to his feet because it was a matter of survival and not wasting any time, the medic explained, "There was a huge explosion and the lights went out. I mean for everyone, not only for you. However, they blinked back shortly before you did, so at least we know the emergency power of the complex is still working. Come on. Can you walk?"

"Y-Yeah, I think so..."

"Good," Roman said, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and carefully leading him towards the door. "Let's find the others and hope there's not much need for my services, then..."

As they walked out of the room, stepping into the deserted hallway, they heard an urgent announcement in Director Animusphere's voice coming through the speakers that apparently where everywhere.

"This is not a drill. I repeat, this is not a drill!" she was saying. "A fire has started in the central power plant and central control room. Our emergency teams are rushing out to deal with the situation, so you are to remain calm! The central division bulkhead will be closing in ninety seconds. All personnel but the strictly necessary, please quickly evacuate from the second gate..."

Ritsuka clenched his teeth. "A terrorist attack...?"

"That'd be horribly foolish and self-destructive in the extreme for anyone living on this planet, since we are its last and only hope," Roman sighed, "so, yeah, most likely. It could be Scientologists, or Christian Fundamentalists, or Islamic Extremists, or Hare Krishnas. Professor Lev himself has designed the whole current infrastructure, so it's unlikely it failed just because..."

"The guy with the funny hair?" Ritsuka asked while the doctor helped him down the corridor. "Demonic Abe Lincoln?"

"Hey, never judge a book by its cover or a man by his hairdo," chided the specialist as they walked, hearing even more sirens of alarm and distant rushed steps along the way. "Geez, this place's a maze, though, if only Mashu were here..."

"Doctor!" Lev's voice shouted from a metallic pin on the chest of his shirt. "Can you hear me, Doctor? We need you at the Conference Hall, there are several wounded in the attendance! I think... many of them will need to undergo cryogenic freezing before we can save them! Come immediately, Doctor!"

"Huh?" Roman blinked, stopping and looking around helplessly. "But, but what's the way there, I don't think I can..."

Ritsuka groaned, pointing back the way from where they had come, and further down the hallway, trying to remember the way Mashu had taken while leading him to his room. "Over there, I think... Go, quick, leave me here, I'll only slow you down..."

Roman gulped, helping him to sit down on the floor, his back against a wall. "Are you sure?" When the boy nodded, the doctor tried to smile at him. "Good fellow. I'll send for help as soon as I can. In the meantime, please stay here unless you absolutely have to take shelter. In the event of a disaster, the-"

"DOCTOR!" Lev's voice shouted through the pin.

"On my way!" Roman gasped, springing back to his feet from his current kneeling position, all the while Ritsuka sighed and gestured for him to go. The boy was slowly drifting back into a heavy stupor, unable to understand Roman's last few words before the man dashed out of sight. Feeling numb all over, the newcomer slumped down, sliding onto the floor, losing his energy and awareness yet again, even through the sound of yet another powerful explosion rattling the whole building...

"Oh God. I think I might need a cigarette. I've never smoked before, but this... this..." Doctor Roman trailed off at the sight of the carnage displayed before him.

("Wait, if he left you behind in the hallway, how do you know he said all that?" Chisame demanded.

"He told me, of course" Ritsuka said. "Anyway…")

"Pull yourself together, Doctor," Professor Lev grimly grimly instructed, leading him through the wreckage of the conference room. "We can get more flatscreen TVs. Fortunately, the Director managed to duck under the podium in time and it shielded her. She only received minor injuries. What little surviving staffers I could gather rounded up the wounded candidates and are delivering them into cryostasis as we speak, with the Director herself supervising them."

("There's no way someone would tell you details that stupid!" Chisame said.

"Chisame, please stop interrupting or we'll have to go for on for a second chapter!" Negi said.

"Fine! But I protest the amount of detail of this extended Backdoor Pilot!")

"Then I should be there," the Doctor protested while flinching as he had to navigate around another mangled TV still in the wreckage, taking care to only step on the dead bodies so as not to be disrespectful. "Where are you taking me? Ah, I know I look kinda girly, but I feel I should remind you that– "

"You already told me you were heterosexual today, Doctor. This had to be sabotage," Lev explained, "and I might need medical assistance while going into the basement's power plant. Not to mention we could find more- ah," he stopped, as they had just ran into another unexpected find while passing through another highly damaged room in their way down the complex.

"Mashu!" Roman gasped, rushing past the now immobile Lev and crouching down by the downed girl's side. She had the lower half of her body stuck under a large pile of rubble, her face bloodied and her breath coming out in stiff, short pants and rasps. He immediately grabbed her by a wrist and took her pulse. "Good Lord, Mashu, hold on there! Whatever you do, try to stay conscious, and please tell me-" There he paused and looked back past his shoulder. "Professor! What are you doing, why aren't you calling some guards?! We can't lift this off her on our own, and we also need a stretcher, and-!"

Lev's face had lost all expression, becoming a shadowy mask of mysterious somberness. "It is pointless, now. It has started."

"What has started?!" Roman demanded, and then it dawned on him, making his voice grow very small and quiet. "Oh, no..."

The speakers somehow came alive again, just to deliver some static filled message that nonetheless was still clearly audible. This time not with Olga's voice, but one that was far more mechanic and inhuman sounding, nearly flat in its delivery of disaster. "Warning to all observing staff. Chaldeas' current status is changing. Shiva's observed near future data is being overwritten. Detecting no traces of humanity on Earth in the next hundred years… Again. Unable to confirm humanity's survival… Again. Humanity's future is not guaranteed... Again."

Mashu coughed and said, wheezing for air, "I am sorry, Professor... Looks like I still couldn't manifest after all, I, I... failed you..."

"Don't be sorry, there's nothing you could have done," Lev matter-of-factly said, still standing on the same spot. "We have entered Red Stage now. We only can wait and brace ourselves for the outcome..."

"Center bulkhead sealed," the speakers announced. "Beginning cleansing of internal structure in 180 seconds. Please take the necessary security measures. Have a nice day, puny humans."

"Wait, did the computer just say something really ominous?" Roman said.

Mashu whimpered, closing her eyes and her small fists impotently. "It's all lost... Too late..."

"We'll manage somehow," Roman promised, placing a hand gently on her scalp.

"Unable to access status of vitals of preserved Masters," was the next announcement. "Unable to reach the minimum of individual required to Leyshift. Seeking eligible Masters... eligible Masters discovered. But no available Servant at hand for them. Incomplete procedure. Leyshift Operation Collapse in three..."

"Please, God," Roman prayed, tightening his closed eyes. "You used to like me, remember? Help?"

"... two..."

"..." Lev said, his face still the same.

"... One."

" _I don't want to die,_ " Mashu whispered, lowering her head. "Ritsuko-sempai still hasn't explained why she needs to rub my breasts every day…"

"Error in the procedure. Repeat, error in the procedure. Immediate system crash in-" the automatized voice spoke one last time.

And then, the whole world went scarlet around everyone.

Right now:

"And... and what happened to your sister?" Negi gulped, paling visibly. "She was there during the explosion, wasn't she? B-But you told us she has other Servants, so..."

"Yes," Chisame said flatly. "Given the amount of detail you gave about a pair of people you weren't even with, _surely_ you can tell us in equal detail what happened to your sister, _right?_ "

"Oh, Ritsuko won't ever die that easily, I should know," Ritsuka said, waving a hand around and not meeting anyone's gaze. "We, uh, must have some kind of a sixth sense linking us together, since after helping the Director out, she went straight to look for me, and from what she told me later, she found me almost instantly. Yes, it's surely that and not because she injected a tracking device in me while I was sleeping. Of course. However..."

* * *

 _Back then:_

"Do you think," Ritsuko asked him as she helped him up again, "we'll be blamed for this, somehow?"

"Why should we? Are you being paranoid again?" Ritsuka said before coughing. He eyed her nervously. "You didn't, ah, _do_ anything, did you?"

"N-no, of course not, dear brother how can you accuse me of stealing the director's panties, how absurd of you! Well, I don't know, it's not like too many others survived so they could blame them, and we don't have any connections, we're easy scapegoats!" the girl protested. "They could say it's our fault because we didn't get in with the program and slowed it down, what do I know about these things?! Argh, it's your fault more than mine anyway, since your grades were even worse than mine! Argh, I'm in despair! This magus society where we have no nepotism to throw our way has left me in despair!"

The boy sighed. "Fine, I'll take responsibility, isn't it what I always do, Mabel?"

"Don't call me Mabel, Dipper!" Ritsuko grumbled to him, then gave another look down the wrecked, burning urban wasteland stretching before them under a starkly red and black sky. The Moon, for some reason, had the letters 'Cha' engraved on it's surface, perfectly legible. "You can walk already?"

"I think so," Ritsuka said, moving his legs around to test them. "But, where did everything else go to?"

"I think it's more like we're the ones who went away," Ritsuko opined, "but don't worry, I'm sure they'll find us soon enough so they can put us on trial over this. In the meanwhile, though, we've gotta move! This spot's gonna burn real soon!"

He nodded, supporting himself on her as they began navigating through the devastated strange land they had just appeared in. Wherever they looked, the only could see the ruins of a burning, destroyed city that once must have been busy and lively, instead of the snowy peaks surrounding Chaldea. If there were any nearby survivors, they couldn't be seen or heard no matter where they happened to be.

* * *

 _Right now:_

By this point in the tale, Shirou and Negi were flinching in unison, their gazes strangely faraway. Even Ritsuka noticed this, and paused. "Something wrong?" he asked them.

"Other than the fact we're trapped up in a paralyzed world, you mean?" Chisame snarked. "Well, yeah, you see, burning cities are kind of a... an awkward subject for both of them..."

"The city where I spent my childhood burned to the ground, and I lost my family," Shirou sighed. "Fuyuki City, have you heard about it?"

"Father…" Negi moaned. "Father! Don't leave me!" Matoi patted him on the head.

Behind him, Mordred, for some completely random reason, sneezed. "Argh, damn it! Mom, why did you make this helmet so hard to wipe?!"

"Um, well," Ritsuka gasped, "as a matter of fact, this city we had just arrived at _was_ Fuyuki City...!"

And Shirou gasped as well. "You mean you were there?! Did you save anyone? You must have saved someone right? How many did you save?"

"Er, well, we were kind of in a hurry, and there didn't seem to be anyone around?" Ritsuka said, looking guilty

"Argh!" Shirou cried. "Damn it, what sort of person just leaves people to die in a city on fire and selfish just saves their own lif– ACHOO!"

"It's unlikely that was the same Fuyuki City, it had to be another world's version," Mordred intervened grimly, voice a bit muffled because they were using a bedcover to wipe the sneeze from the inside of their helmet while it was still on their head. Saber was looking on in disapproval. "Go on, Master, get to the point, and the part where you fight Father, fast!"

"You fought her, too?!" Shirou grew further bewildered, pointing at his Saber.

"It's not unusual there would be another version of me in another world, why to make such a scandal out of it, Shirou?" the blonde calmly asked him.

"Of course it's unusual, no matter how many times it happens, anything related to parallel worlds and parallel people will always be unusual!" Chisame insisted.

"Actually, if it happens that often, don't you think technically it already fits the definition of 'usual' then...?" Ako asked, looking aside guiltily.

Chisame began rubbing her temples. "No, no, I refuse to accept that, ever! Look, just continue with your stupid story, will you?!"

"Alright," Ritsuka gulped, all too happy to deviate back from this strange, somewhat maniacal, tangent. "Anyway, then we finally found Mashu, still pinned under the same pile of rubble and bleeding to death..."

"I... I think I'll go take some fresh air outside for a moment, if you don't mind..." Ako announced, wobbling her way to the front door with a hand on her stomach.

"Don't wander too far, and come back at the first sign of danger, I beg you," Negi warned her before asking Ritsuka, "but, where had the Professor and the Doctor gone?"

"Only we, Mashu, and the Director had Leyshifted into Fuyuki," Ritsuka explained. "The rest of the survivors remained at Chaldea, or at least that's what we thought at first..."

"Wait, what director?" Chisame said. "You didn't mention any director!"

"Didn't I?" Risuka said. "Oh, well, my sister and I met the director somewhere along the way. I thought I told you."

"Ah, yeah, the Director," Chamo puffed on a cigarette. "Bet she was one of those old stuffy matron types, the bossy overbearing boss, right?"

"Um, no, actually, she was very young and, ah, well, attractive," Ritsuka said. "She had a bit of a temper, maybe, but nobody's perfect, right? As I was saying, Mashu was in pretty bad shape, we really thought she wouldn't make it, and Sis said-"

* * *

 _Back then:_

"We'll be blamed for this too," Ritsuka gloomily predicted.

"Shut up and help me with this!" Ritsuka said as he frantically grabbed piece of rubble after piece of rubble and pulled them aside as best as he could with his not-precisely-Herculean arms. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"Just a sec, please," Ritsuko said, gently holding a cellphone in front of Mashu's mouth. "Mashu-chan, can you please leave testimony we aren't to be blamed of anything that happened to you...?"

"RITSUKO!" Ritsuka shouted.

"I'm on it, I'm on it!" Ritsuko said piously, already starting to move rubble away twice as fast as her brother. "But you're aware doing this should be left to emergency services, right? We could be making things even worse by randomly moving things around!" she pointed out while randomly moving things around.

"It can't be helped, it doesn't look like anyone'll be coming to help anytime soon!" the boy answered. "Hang in there, Mashu-san! Try to stay awake! Don't follow the light yet! Breathe in and out, slowly..."

Mashu sighed. "It's okay, Sempai. Thank you... for doing this for me. I only wish... I could help you..."

As she said this, a tall, lanky, sinister figure in solid, inky black interrupted only by the bone white of a macabre skull mask loomed from behind the unsuspecting siblings, perfectly silent and stealthy, poised to strike down with elegant and deadly precision...

But then, Mashu let out a panicked cry. "Sempai! Behind you...!"

* * *

 _Right now:_

Ako walked rather aimlessly through the frozen crowd, feeling like she was walking through her own silent garden of sculptures, or those creepy angel statues from that British show they'd tried to watch to get closer to Negi-sensei. Mostly she was looking for Makie, Akira and Yuuna, before realizing she really didn't want to see them if they were... like this at the moment.

Sighing sadly, she sat down on a bench to think, then caught a glance of a shifty-looking boy paralyzed in the middle of sneaking a hand into the back pocket of a father with his little daughter sitting on his shoulders, beginning to pull the older man's wallet out. Frowning to herself, the girl walked up to them, moved the boy around as best as she could, and placed his hand instead on the butt of a bulky, intimidating shirtless man who looked like a trucker on an extended leave. Stepping back, she examined her Handiwork of Justice before smiling to herself in a pleased way.

Feeling a bit better now, Ako headed towards the stall of an ice-cream seller, placed enough coins for two orders before him, and poured herself two vanilla cones before bowing to the still merchant of icy goodness. Absently humming a variant of _Happy Material_ to herself, she walked back into the infirmary.

"… then Mashu defeated Assassin by beating him up with a shield the size of a table," Ritsuka was saying to Shirou as Ako sat down next to Negi, handing him one of the cones.

"Here, Sensei, it's on me," she told him.

"Oh!" he blinked, snapping out of Ritsuka's tale and accepting the ice-cream. "Ah, thank you, Izumi-san, that's very kind from you. Is everyone out there...?"

"No one's moving at all yet, no," Ako confirmed while Ritsuka continued talking, the others' attention still focused on him. All but Matoi, of course, who like usual kept her JIIIIIII squarely on Chisame. "So, um, the bloody and violent parts are over by now, aren't they...?"

* * *

 _Back then:_

"Master!" Shielder cried as a long chain with a hook went flying, wrapping itself around Ritsuka's right leg and tightening on the limb, cutting deep and drawing blood out through the cloth of his pants, making him yell in pain.

* * *

 _Right now:_

"Okay, I'll be back later, then," Ako sighed as she walked out again.

"Wuss," Mordred muttered under her breath.

* * *

 _Back then:_

"So, an unknown Master, and an unknown Servant," darkly chuckled the tall, shapely woman with long purplish purple who had just appeared from between the flames after Assassin's bloody death (or close facsimile thereof). She still held her end of the chain firmly, tugging on it and dragging Ritsuka to the ground. "How young and fresh you look...!"

* * *

 _Right… Oh, you know the drill by now!_

"That..." Saber doubted. "That woman is crueler than the one we know, but otherwise, it almost sounds like she was..."

* * *

 _Take a wild guess:_

As Olga, Ritsuko and Shielder pulled Ritsuka back, the hooded dark beauty chuckled, walking towards the petrified form of a young man with seaweed-shaped short hair. She wrapped an arm around his shoulders and chuckled, drawing her long purple fingernails all over his face. "Don't you dare complain! When you walk into my hunting grounds, I'm free to treat you however I please, am I not?"

With an abrupt motion of her arm, she shattered the boy's head off and blood sprayed from his severed neck in all directions, like in a bad (read: average) episode of Fist of the North Star, or like in any confrontation between Artoria and the Black Knight. Olga, Shielder and Ritsuka gasped in shock at the brutality, Ritsuko simply stared, and Fou gasped, "Kyu, kyu fouh fouh, fouhhhh!" which probably equated to some measure of 'Motherfucker!'

"Motherfucker!" Ritsuko said for him, to which Fou nodded, thus proving our point.

"Don't worry," the woman with the lance said, "I may have lost one statue, but now I'm going to have four new ones." She slowly licked her blood stained lips and looked at them invitingly, her long weapon extended before her.

"Our only option is to fight," Shielder steeled herself, deploying her massive shield before the others. "But leave it all to me, please. This is what I was born for."

"Are you sure you can take her?" the concerned Olga asked.

"Yes," the shorter girl nodded, stepping ahead with renewed resolve. "Please trust me, Director. The Shielder Class has no weakness against Lancers!"

"How bold, how delightful!" the Lancer softly cackled. "Is this your first time fighting for your Master? I don't see how someone like you could have ever ascended to the Throne. But don't worry. If you didn't have an epic death then, you will have it now!"

She twirled her sharp lance around, the side shaped like a large hook glinting under the light of the moon shyly peeking through the clouds of rising smoke. And then she effectively vanished from sight altogether, making Shielder and those later hearing the tale gasp (and Chisame to roll her eyes at the completely expected cliche). A second later, she reappeared right before Mashu, repeatedly striking at her with impressively fast thrusts of her weapon. However, Mashu's shield was simply too big and kept on blocking each attack effectively, despite of which the taller Servant quickly began pushing her back with her savage intensity.

("Why does this fight sound so sexual?" Chisame said.)

"My lance is the Lance of Immortal Killing!" the woman boasted. "Any wound delivered by it cannot be healed by any means! All I need is a single successful hit... and soon I shall have it!"

"Director!" Ritsuko shouted at Olga, "Give me a Servant, too! Otherwise that tramp's gonna kill us all!"

"I, I can't just give you a Servant, just like that!" the silver haired young woman claimed, keeping the stunned Ritsuka grabbed by the shoulders. "Even if you weren't a failure as a Magus, I don't have any relics at hand, I don't even know how your brother did it!"

" _I won't fail them!_ " Shielder growled like a braindead shounen manga protagonist in an 'exciting' multi-episode fight, refuting Lancer's attempted breaking rant by charging forward with a new burst of determination without a plan, but Lancer easily leapt over her, spinning in mid-air to land on her feet behind the other Servant. Olga gasped in fear, recognizing that was the opening Lancer had been waiting for. With her superior speed, surely she could pierce Shielder through the back before-

However, surprising her, Lancer went for another approach, perhaps being too confident and prone to playing with her prey for her own good. From her long hair she produced several more metal chains ("Wait, metal chains?" Chisame said. "Whwne did that come up?" "She made metal chains with her hair. Didn't I tell you that? I'm pretty sure I did.") which she wrapped around all the humans, corralling them tightly together as she stood on a large chunk of a destroyed building. "I will crush all of you in a single blow," she decided. "Any last words?"

Shielder, stepping before her charges once again with her defense tool at the ready, exhaled in frustration. "I don't think I can win against her," she confessed to the youngsters, "but I can delay her while you run. Don't look back, Sempai! I'm sure the Doctor and the Professor will retrieve you soon!"

"It's not like we really can run anywhere!" Ritsuko protested.

"She's right! We can't leave you to die here!" the boy said.

"Um, well, yeah, that, and there are chains all around us, we can't get past them!" Ritsuko pointed out.

Then, from the fire, a soft, manly chuckle. "Well, well, well..."

Lancer's head snapped in the direction of the voice, and her fine lips spat bitter poison. "Caster! Finally you show up, you, cowardly vermin...!"

The also-hooded figure in blue who had just appeared on top of another mountain of rubble smiled enigmatically. Negi, always eager to hear about hooded strangers doing heroic last second rescues in burning urban locations, paid careful attention, dearly hoping for a familiar revelation. "I'm sorry," he said, as he pulled his hood back, showing a face Negi thought he recognized from Ritsuka's narration... but not in the way he had hoped. "But I had other matters to tend to first. Your friend Berserker's gone, I'm afraid, but if it's any consolation, he gave me my fiercest battle ever. Certainly better than what's about to come..."

Ritsuko's eyes shone dreamily. "Who... What... What a hunk...!" she swooned.

Lancer sneered. "Don't tell me you're going to side with these wanderers, Caster? Have you gone that far out of your mind? Saber will still accept you, but give me any cause to-"

"It's better than siding up with you, witch, that's all!" Caster growled at her with utter disgust, creating several burning runes in the air by merely waving a hand, and then mercilessly blasting at the dark woman with them...

* * *

 _Okay, this is getting ridiculous. Listen, I got into the narration business because all I ever wanted to do was tell people where things were taking place, and how much later those things were from the last things they saw taking place! At firs it was great. Bliss. But the more we continue, the more it seems like you guys can't tell what the scene breaks are and what they're for, and frankly, I'm done enabling this sort of thoughtless readership, so y'all can find someone else to narrate the rest of this chap, because I am out! Figure out if we're in the present or in a flashback on your own, it's not that hard!_

"Okay, hm," Chisame rubbed her chin. "That guy reminds me of someone, too, except he's a Lancer and not a Caster..."

"Seriously?" Mordred asked. "That's funny, because he's always saying he'd rather have been summoned as a Lancer."

"Your Grail War is all screwed up!" Asuna protested. "The Lancer should have been Rider, and the Caster should have been Lancer, and what's next, this guy was Temptress back there?" she asked, pointing up at Berserker.

Berserker pondered those words, looked down at himself, quickly fondled himself on the crotch, and took on a bodybuilder pose, flexing like an actor-turned-governator. _**"Grwlf?"**_

Ritsuka sighed. Again. "That wasn't 'our' War any more than yours, either! Also, we don't have any Temptresses, well, not under that Class, at least! Listen, to make a long story a bit shorter– "

"Too late," Chisame, Satomi, Chamo, Shirou, Matoi, Illya, and Sayako said. Berserker said _**"GRWLF!"**_ but from contest it was easy to tell what he meant.

"– with Caster's help we managed to defeat Lancer..."

"You mean Caster finished her up while you stood back doing nothing," Mordred reminded him.

Ritsuka sighed again. Again. "Okay, if you want to get technical, yes! However, the worst was yet to come, as the Archer of Fuyuki showed up next..."

* * *

 _Back then: hI i'M tHE nEW gUY_

"What's that?!" Ritsuko gasped, pointing up at a fast moving red blur zooming through the sky, towards them. "Is that Captain Marvel? Superman? Has the Flash finally run so fast no rules of physics apply to him anymore?"

Caster looked up as well, making Mashu very thankful since he'd been growing too close and, er, Ritsuko-like for her comfort. "Damn," he said. "He's found us."

"Who...?" Ritsuka asked, right before the red projectile exploded right above their heads, showering the whole area with scarlet fragments that exploded on contact with the pavement, shattering the street all around them. Only the fact Mashu had raised her shield in time to cover them, with Caster supplying additional protection with a barrage of runes, kept the Chaldea contingent alive. "Mashu-san!"

"Please stay there, Sempai!" she shouted over the sounds of the pieces exploding everywhere. "There are more of them coming!"

And indeed, moments later, the sky flared once more and another deluge of explosive magic blanketed the intersection where the lost travelers stood with the frowning Caster, who grimly said, "That's Archer, no doubt. He, along with all other Servants in this War but me, has been corrupted by the Grail. He won't stop until we are either converted as well or dead... or until he is." He now cracked a hardened smile, with a glint in his left eye. "I think I'll go with the third option, myself. You?"

"Third, third's definitely good!" Ritsuko agreed, while Olga couldn't help but nodding quickly. "Stick your gay bulge into his raw ass!"

"Er, no," Caster said, leaning slightly away from her, drawing another rune in the air and then projecting it at the top of a building on the other side of what was left of the city, from where Olga and Mashu could now see the projectiles were coming. A moment later, that rooftop blew up in a deafening boom, Caster watching with narrowed eyes. "That should buy us some time, at least."

"Some time?!" Ritsuko gasped. "You must've killed him! Not that I'm holding it against you, but-!"

"No, it's never that easy," Caster said, shaking his head. "He's just retreated. We can't beat him in a long distance fight, so we'll have to take the battle directly to him..."

* * *

 _Right now:_

"That Archer sounds like... a very mean customer," Shirou mused after pondering his words in Negi's presence. "You said he was corrupted by the Grail, but was he good or already evil before that?"

"Red arrows that explode… that sounds kinda familiar," Negi said.

Ritsuka paused, giving him an uncertain look. "Well... Let's just say he was, from what I learned later, a basically good-intentioned 'The end justifies the means' kind of guy who maybe took it too far in his life."

"Oh, then it can't be Black Archer, then," Matoi said. "She's a little pervert on the border of being an evil supervillain or pedophile rapist."

"That's the quickest way to hell," Shirou disapproved, folding his arms and shaking his head. "I think anyone trying to fight for the greater good should never lose sight of the boundaries a hero must follow– Achoo!"

"Bless you," Negi said with a nod. "Definitely,we mustn't be blinded by darkness in the pursuit of our goals, or we'll become monsters oursel– ACHOO!" Fortunately he didn't sneeze that hard and nobody's clothes were shredded.

"Bless you," Shirou smiled at him, Negi smiled back, and they bumped fists together. "That's the right mindset, Sensei!"

"You said it, Emiya-san!"

Mordred looked back and forth between them. "It's... It's like you're just going out of your way to challenge your fate by waving a flag in its face, what in the world's wrong with you two?!"

Chisame sighed. "Oh, if we told you, we'd take even longer than your Master is taking, pal. By the way, Sempai, hurry it up already, I'm growing tired of this and the chapter's almost over..."

"Ah, right, sorry," Ritsuka nodded. "With Caster's help we finally corralled Archer, and they had a very... badass confrontation..."

* * *

 _Back then:_

"I don't know why either Saber or you think you can protect her from us," Caster provoked the tanned man while gesturing with a flair that made Ritsuko swoon again, "but either way, let's finish this already."

"Hm!" Archer scoffed, manifesting his bow again in a hand. In the other, he summoned a sword, which he put in the bow before firing at the team. "Finally, something we can agree on..."

* * *

 _Right now:_

"Maybe Black Archer is a man in that universe?" Negi said. "Because using swords as arrows is definitely what she does."

"Maybe it's the mirror-universe of Black Archer's universe," Matoi suggested. "One where she's good and a man."

"Masteeer!" Mordred whined in a way that was both very funny and very creepy through the thick mass of her helmet. "Enough of that, I don't care how 'badass' the fight was, just get to the good part already! The part where you fought Father!"

"Yes, do get already," Saber agreed, her tone still cold and sedate but her nodding very interested and rapid. For once the family resemblance was very obvious.

"But, this was the coolest part, I thought... Oh well, Caster opened a path for us by tricking Archer during their fight IN A VERY COOL WAY I'D REALLY LIKE TO TELL YOU ABOUT, so Archer disappeared in a shower of light sparkles just like the Assassin and Lancer, so we could enter this dark cave full of black ooze where Saber waited for us..."

"Oh yes, that's where the story gets really exciting!" Mordred said with two strong armored gloves right under her concealed chin.

"Wait a moment, Young Fujimaru," Saber aloofly commanded Ritsuka, before walking to the door and calling out. "Izumi-san! Please do bring me a Jumbo bucket of popcorn and a Large Big Gulp soda, would you?!"

"Haiiiiiiiiiiiii!" came Ako's resigned answer from the outside.

"Good young lady," Saber approved with a nod, then walked back to the group and sitting back down next to Shirou. "Continue then, but do not get into the fight proper until my refreshments have arrived."

"Father, you should have asked for mine as well!" Mordred pointed out.

"You are already an adult, Mordred, you should have asked for them yourself," Saber chided her. "You wish to be recognized as independent, do you not?"

"This wasn't about independence, it was about hospitality to a visitor!"

"The more they talk, the more even I can tell they're related," Shirou said, sounding horrified.

Ritsuka sighed yet again. Again. "Now that I think back on it, perhaps I felt a bit more comfortable in that Saber's presence than I do now..."

"Berserker, stop posing," Illya sighed. "Yes, your muscles look cool, now stop it!"

* * *

 _Back then:_

Slowly, the pale woman opened her nearly serpentine golden eyes, devoid of any emotion or warmth. Eldritch and abominable tears like crawling scabs went up from her collar to her cheeks, framing her beautiful face like that of a sinister but elegantly gorgeous doll. The rest of her attire was similarly dark, much like the palpitating mud covering her rocky surroundings.

She spoke, with a cold, controlled voice that sent chills down everyone's spines.

"What an interesting Servant," she said, eyeing Shielder carefully. "What is your place of origin?"

"That... That is Saber?" asked Ritsuka.

Olga Marie nodded. "She's incredibly powerful as well! I'd never felt that kind of strength before..."

"Her power is OVER NINE THOOOUUUSAND! " Ritsuko cried, because of course she would, sigh.

Shielder clenched her small white teeth, trying to endure Saber's piercing inhuman stare that was worse than the director telling her she was disappointed in her. The dark Servant continued. "Won't you answer? For I suspect we share a country; that table you hold more than once held my fests. You can keep it if that is your wish, however. I no longer hunger for anything, but the Grail I serve does. And I shall feed it with your essence!" she defiantly roared, jumping down while swinging her long blade around.

The sword's edge clashed viciously against the shield's surface, sparks flying everywhere. Mashu was pushed back further than she had been by Lancer previously, since this Servant was that much fiercer than the hooded woman. It took all of her strength simply to endure enough to not be toppled by the sheer force of Saber's attacks.

Mashu had to remain mostly stationary as the more mobile and agile Saber unleashed the brunt of her skilled and feverishly savage sword strikes on her shield, relying on its size to make up for her comparative lack of fighting aptitude. Ritsuka chewed on his lower lip, unsure of what to do to help. He kept on waiting for Olga to suggest something, but she only stood there chewing on her thumb while frantically trying to think of alternatives.

"We're screwed, aren't we?" Ritsuko summed up rather succinctly, and her brother feared also accurately.

"Gh… gh… !" the director said, still chewing.

"Aren't you too old to still be sucking your thumb?" Ritsuko couldn't help asking.

"Shut up!" the director cried, pulling her thumb away. "I don't suck my thumb, I'm a big girl now! Er, I mean… SHUT UP!"

"What's wrong?" Saber challenged, at last showing some emotion. "Why won't you come forward? To defend, you also need to retaliate! Otherwise you are only stalling, child!"

"Mashu, let's pull back!" Ritsuka urged. "Please!"

"That's not a choice anymore," Olga grimly declared. "She won't let us."

Finally, Saber swung with enough might to send Mashu flying and crashing against a stone wall, from where she slumped to the ground like a thrown rangdoll. "Oh, geez..." Ritsuko flinched while the shield rolled away from Mashu's hands.

"I understand how you feel," Saber simply stated, marching towards the fallen Shielder, who even now struggled to get back up. "Painfully so... Let me, then, put an end to your heartache."

Mashu breathed out, grabbing her shield and pushing herself back on her feet with its support. "Thanks for the offer. But I'm afraid I'll have to decline."

"So be it," Saber said, and swung forward again. The next clash of their weapons sent Mashu staggering down to her trembling knees, while Saber stood over her, glowering from the power that flowed from the Grail Mud into her. "Your duty ends now, Protector," she said, lifting her sword, ready to deliver the final blow. _**"EXCALIBUR MORGAN!"**_

* * *

 _Right now:_

Shirou blinked. "Ex... Calibur?!"

Negi, in turn, blinked at him. "Emiya-san, after hearing Saber's child is named Mordred, does this still come as a shock to you?"

"Um, no, I guess it shouldn't," Shirou admitted, scratching the back of his neck. "Still, it's kinda weird all the same, seeing King Arthur's wife came to wield his sword that well..."

Negi, Illya, Saber, Mordred and Ritsuka immediately facefaulted hard on the infirmary's floor. Everyone else, even Berserker, settled for facepalming.

"What?!" Shirou said. "Saber has to be King Arthur's wife, Queen Guinevere! It's the only explanation that makes sense! I've read books on European folklore, you know! I bought them from the bookstore and everything to try and figure out who Saber was!"

"Obviously not enough!" Illya screeched, springing back up. "Otherwise you'd know Guinevere was not Mordred's mother, and why would Mordred call her 'father' anyway?!"

Shirou looked at Mordred. "That's a good question. Why do you call your mother 'father' in any instance?"

"Because he's my father, you imbecile!" Mordred shouted.

Shirou gave her a really weirded out long drawn stare, then coughed, "Let's start from the beginning here. I know there's cultural precedent for Queen Guinevere as an action woman. Looking through the Internet for clues on powerful legendary women, I once saw this American manga that said Guinevere was a blond warrior known as-"

"That's a Rob Liefeld comic, how can you put any trust in that garbage?!" Illya protested before feeling several questioning glances on her and coughing, "N-Not that I know anything on comics and that trash, that's just one of Sayoko's hobbies, hmph!"

"Mine?" Sayoko blinked. "W-Well, if you say so..."

"Anyway, I then placed my hand on Mashu's to help her endure the very big blast from Excalibur Morgan, I told her I believed in her, our connection as Master and Servant made the shield grow into a literal huge glowing wall that sent the blast back at Saber, we almost defeated her, and then Caster showed up again and finished her off with a Wicker Man! Happy now?!" Ritsuka threw his hands up.

"Masterrrrrrr!" Mordred growled. "What kind of lamebrained way to finish an epic tale is that, for shame?!"

"Well, I can't help it if people around here won't let me finish a story properly!" the boy retorted.

Ako blinked. "You defeated her with a Nicholas Cage movie?"

"I can understand that, most of them are truly terrible," Saber nodded.

"'The Rock' is a modern classic! It even has Connery, you never can wrong with Connery!" Shirou protested.

"That explains SO much about you, Emiya-sempai," Chisame said blandly.

"Even Zardoz?" Negi said, disbelieving.

"ALL Sean Connery is perfection!" Shirou asserted.

"League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?" Ako asked.

"An acquired taste, but very underrated by critics!"

Berserker, in a rare show of initiative, picked up Illya and took her to the other side of the room, as far from this madman as physically possible.

* * *

 _Back then:_

Saber still managed to smile, even through the thick blood, poisoned with Grail Mud, flowing down her perfect features. "I see," she softly said, while her body began disappearing into radiant sparkles. "You still retain the power born from defending others, while I lost mine, and with it my edge. Ultimately, no matter how Fate changes, I'm doomed to face the same destiny when I'm left alone."

"What does that mean?" Caster asked her. "Something you want to tell us before going away?"

"Eventually, you will know what you need to know, Ireland's Child of Light. But now, both your time and mine have passed. Let us vanish into the ether as these children fight for the future that is rightfully thei-"

"Wait!" Ritsuko cried. "You don't have to go! Why don't you... Make a Contract with me and become my Magical Servants...?!"

At this point, were this some anime, we would have a very tight closeup on one of Ritsuko's eyes as some abrupt chilling music shrieks taking over the scene. As it happens, you will have to imagine that happening.

For some reason, Ritsuka shuddered in mortal dread and had the sudden urge to inject his sister with platypus venom. As this was a perfectly normal occurrence, he paid it no mind.

Saber actually paused enough in her disappearance as to ask, incredulously, "I beg your pardon...?"

"Nah, you'd need to earn it," the girl said. "After all, you tried to kill us! Look, I'm not a resentful gal, and I doubt either of you have got anything better to do, so whaddya say, huh? If my brother here can have one Servant, then I surely can have two..."

"Two?" Olga scoffed. "That's just plain ridiculous, I'd be surprised if you can support even one!"

Saber and Caster looked at each other, dubiously, then shared world-weary shrugs of shoulders. What was the worst thing that could result from contracting with this child, in any case...?

In hindsight, the fact they heard thunder roll at that moment despite being very deep underground should probably have clued them in.

* * *

 _Right now:_

"And that's how my Sis gained her first two Servants," Ritsuka finished. "Boy, she'll be surprised to learn there are two of each here, too...!"

"Good thing she isn't here, she'd try adding them to her collection as well," Mordred observed.

"Harem, not collection," Ritsuka reminded her.

"I stand corrected," she had to admit.

Negi blinked. "You shouldn't make 'harem' jokes at your sister's expenses, Fujimaru-san. That no doubt annoys her, much like it happens to Yue-san. Anyway, what happened to Olga Marie-san, did she get several Servants of her own as well?"

Ritsuka just grimaced deeply, unable to answer, as Mordred easily answered for him. "Oh, no, she was horribly killed off shortly afterwards by that Lev guy, who turned out to be the damned traitor who set up the explosion at Chaldea."

"Ah," Chisame said. "Now I see why you didn't bother to set up her character properly, thank you. Otherwise, Negi-sensei would really be crushed over her death now..."

"Ahhhh, poor Animusphere-san...!" Negi cried, desperately wiping his tearful eyes with this fists. "How could that happen to her, she was such a good and wonderful person...!"

"It's all right, Negi-kun," Ritsuka said, trying to comfort him. "I'm sure she's in a better place now and not secretly hidden in my sister's room, de-aged into a loli, and subject to many dark and terrible things…" He looked away, not meeting anyone's eyes.

Chisame sighed. "Well, anyway. Now that's finally out of the way, we can concentrate on what to do about this-"

"Wait!" Mordred said. "I still haven't told you of how I met Master yet!"

"I'm sure that's unimportant for the task at hand, Mordred," her father told her. "Why to waste any valuable time going over it?"

"What?! H-How can you say that?! Evil, nasty, no-good father...! I HATE YOU!"

For the first time ever, as she watched them go at it again, Ako felt like maybe HER own family situation was not THAT bad after all. Saber-san was a really bad dad.

* * *

 **To be Continued.**


	5. Frozen

"Okay, let's start focusing on what's really important right now!" Hasegawa Chisame said, slamming both hands on Izumi Ako's infirmary desk, something Ako found to be quite on the rude side, given the circumstances. "We've got a time-related crisis that happened right after the watch given to Negi-sensei by a classmate whose alternate dimension counterpart outright stated she was a time traveler! Do you know what that MUST mean?!"

"That Negi-sensei really knows how to keep things from us even when he shouldn't have?" Ako proved she also could deadpan when she wanted to.

Negi flinched.

"That the linearity of time is an illusion brought about by being only able to perceive a limited number of dimensions?" Satomi said.

"That you're absolutely correct and our lives are bizarrely screwed up beyond any sane reasoning, Chisame-sama?" Matoi asked.

"That we're the only ones in a position to save the world from this time aberration?" Shirou said, sounding heroically eager, in an overly-dramatic CW hero show kind of way.

"That now there's no force in creation to stop my sister from going completely insane?" Ritsuko said, making Mordred shudder.

"That we need to send Berserker to find her and kill her?" Illya said. Having Berserker kill problems always solved everything! It always worked when she ran out of batteries!

"That we need more food?" Saber said, having already finished her popcorn in the time between chapters.

"I mean," Chisame growled, "what has just happened, other than the whole part where revived genderbent spirits of heroes and villains from the past come from parallel worlds, must be the result of Negi-sensei breaking Chao's damn watch! So we'd better fix it if we want to get this mess sorted out!"

"I think there was an episode of the Simpsons just like this," Ako said.

"That is a completely horrifying thought," Sayoko said.

"Well, we have Satomi-nee and Emiya here with us," Chamo shrugged. "So what's the problem?"

"Chamo-san, I'm not that sure I could repair a functional time machine in, well, a short frame of time," Satomi argued. "I'm sure I'll understand its functions eventually after looking into it, but I never was part of any experiments Chao had involving manipulation of the timestream. My specialty lies in Robotics and Aerodynamics, remember…?"

"And, well, I'll try my best too, but I'm no rocket scientist, I'm good at things like freezers and heaters, but a time machine?" Shirou said. "I'm not even sure how that would work, much less show to put it back together without freezing us as well…"

"And it's not like we can ask Chao, she must be paralyzed as well," Ako sighed, looking down at the cellphone in her hand. "She won't even answer my calls…"

"Maybe we should try contacting Leonardo, Edison and Blavatsky at Chaldea?" Mordred asked Ritsuka. "This weird area effect shouldn't have reached all the way there, right?"

"I don't think so," her Master admitted, "but—"

Then someone appeared at the massive hole in the wall, startling them all but the Sabers, who merely drew their weapons calmly at the newcomer, and Negi, who only sighed and said, "Ah, well, I guess we should've been waiting for you after all. Nice to see you again, Pluto-san."

"You…" Chisame lowered her Virtual Scepter. "Hey, that's right, you're that other Sailor Senshi from Kyoto! Sailor Pluto!"

"There are more of them?" Saber frowned, keeping her watergun trained on the blond woman in the stylized sailor fuku and tall boots.

"Yes, of course there are," Negi stood back up, walking up to the frowning Senshi of Time, who had still said nothing. "Emiya-san, Saber-san, this is, as Chisame said, Sailor Pluto, the contemporary of Venus, Mercury and Mars-san, although she prefers acting independently of them. She is the Guardian of the Gates of Time, so she should be able to help us…"

"What are they," Pluto coldly asked, pointing at Mordred and her Master, "doing here, Negi Springfield?"

"And what is that to you? None of your business, arrogant wench!" Mordred snarled. "Address a Knight of the Round properly before questioning his purpose!"

"Didn't you quit?" Saber said. "I distinctly remember you quitting before you broke into my treasure chamber and stole one of my spare swords."

"Fa-ther! Stop remembering inconvenient details!"

Berserker backed that up with a feral grunt and another attempt to move forward with killing intent, but once again Illya stopped him with nothing but a hand gesture and a solemn shake of her head. She was curious about the next twist in this story, and stomping that woman into a red blot could always wait. Though she wished she had more popcorn. "Sayoko! More popcorn! And a Large Big Gulp!"

"Yes, ojou-sama," the maid said, stepping out of the infirmary.

"You don't belong in this timeline, your presence here is anathema," Pluto coldly told the armored knight. "What brought you here? Your mere presence is sending ripples all across the fabric of time… well, _more_ ripples, anyway."

"Were was this quick reaction the last time something like this happened?" Chisame said. "We didn't see you until Kyoto!"

Sailor Pluto looked aside, trying to ignore that one. "W-Well?

Ritsuka exhaled and inhaled. "Sorry," he said. "Don't worry about us, we won't be here for long, we never are. You could say we're only… temporary consultants with situations of cosmic crisis." That was what Doctor Roman had suggested saying to particularly insightful locals in the way of explanations, at least. It was the one that made the most sense, anyway. Honestly, what idiot would really accept 'We're making a superhero indie movie'? "We represent Chaldea Organization, and my name is Fujimaru Ritsuka, this is my—"

"Chaldea!" Sailor Pluto asked, pulling back with wider eyes, her hands tightening around her Time Key. "But, that outcome was averted! That man killed himself before succumbing to Goetia's will!"

"In this world, maybe," Ritsuka observed. "In ours, however? I'm afraid not! Er, we're talking about the same man, right? About this tall, where's a tophat in this day and age, looks like a demonic Abraham Lincoln?"

"Yes, him." The Sailor Guardian of Pluto groaned miserably, her shoulders drooping. "They're here as well, aren't they? How bad is this?"

"I'll say this for you guys," Ako mused aloud very quietly. "At the very least, no moment spent with you is ever boring."

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice.**

 **Chapter Five**.

 **'Frozen' or 'Finally, Disney Is Providing Representation To The Lesbian Incest Community'.**

* * *

Based on the works and copyrighted creations of Akamatsu Ken, Kodansha, Nasu Kinoko, Type-Moon, Gainax Studios, Anno Hideaki, Sadamoto Yoshiyuki, Takeuchi Naoko, Shueisha, Sunrise Studios, and others.

An Ala Iridia Production

Starring:

Negi Springfield as The Hero.

Emiya Shirou as The Other Hero.

Hasegawa Chisame as The Heroine.

Fujimaru Ritsuka as The hero from the mobile game.

Illyasviel von Einzbern as The Loli.

Artoria Pendragon as Saber.

Mordred Pendragon as Saber in Red.

Tsunetsuki Matoi as The Stalker.

Hasegawa Satomi as The Mad Scientist.

Izumi Ako as The Nurse.

Chamo as The White Weasel.

Heracles, Prince of power, Lion of Olympus, as Berserker.

Akagi Ritsuko as The Older Woman Trying To Pass Themselves Off As Seventeen.

OverMaster as The Author.

And Featuring Shadow Crystal Mage as The Long Suffering Corrector and Editor Who Is Definitely Still Working On His Fics, Promise!

In glorious Fanfic Vision ™.

Filmed on IMAX.

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"So..." Doctor Roman hesitated to ask, sipping from his cup of coffee, branded 'World's Greatest King/Dad/Sage/Doctor/Fan of MagiMari', "have you managed to contact them yet?"

Leonardo shook her head, pushing her stylish glasses up her elegant nose as she checked on her computer readings again. "No. There's some sort of unidentified interference paralyzing our communications, but I'm trying to find ways around it. How's Ritsuko-chan dealing with it?"

"Hmmm, well," the good Doctor rasped. "She's trying to be proactive about it, at least. She promised she'd make sure to fight for those two in the event Ritsuka's team doesn't return before the next Singularity is detected. That's... That's a good sign, isn't it?"

The gorgeous woman shrugged. "I hope so, but then sometimes all we can do is hope, don't you agree...?"

Meanwhile, in her room, Ritsuko quietly hummed to herself as she amassed udon dough, Grail Mud and pieces of Infinite Pancake together, then mixed them with random pages from a book on American History and Folklore. "This will work, you'll see, I'll get myself either a Pecos Bill or a Cyber John Wilkes Booth, maybe even a Teddy-chan Roosevelt or a Georgina Washington! Hey, not that it matters at all, but Ben Franklin had an unmatched sexual appetite, didn't he...?" she casually asked the Servant standing behind her. "Hah ha, soon, soon, the ultimate super-duper-ultra-rare five-star will be mine!"

Gilles de Rais (Caster edition!) gulped nervously, putting a bony hand to his chest and clutching it. "P-Perhaps we are treading into dangerous ground that shouldn't be explored, Master...!"

In the corner, tied up, gagged and wearing a frilly loligoth dress that had zippers in suspicious places, the loli-fied Olga Marie whimpered at Ritsuko's latest Beast-like affront against reality.

* * *

 _Back then:_

The figure in armor stepped out from the thick fog, pointing their sword at Ritsuka, Ritsuko and Shielder. "Halt! Who are you, and what are your intentions in this-"

* * *

 _Right now:_

"OH, no! We aren't doing THAT again!" Illya said, throwing her small hands up.

Mordred frowned. "Foolish brat! Whoever gave you the right to gainsay me?!"

"Berserker," said the little girl sitting on the shoulders of a nigh-unstoppable demigod.

"Mordred, no," her bikini-clad father told her.

"But even you must agree it's not fair for the daughter of, at best, some magi from a lesser era to silence any warrior from your-!"

"Mordred," Artoria sighed wearily, "I believe none of us are in the mood for more stories anymore. Listening to the people's will is also part of a ruler's responsibilities."

Illya, Shirou, Sayoko, Ako, Negi, Chisame, Satomi, Matoi, Asuna, Chamo, Ritsuka and Heracles all nodded.

"You sound like that dirt farmer from that anarchosyndicalist commune!" Mordred whined, glared at them in impotent rage, then stomped away to go sulk off at a corner, arms folded.

"Please excuse her, Ma'am, she can't help being kind of grouchy, but she's a good person regardless," Ritsuka whispered to Pluto.

Pluto nodded. "I understand, that kind of young woman is rather abundant around these parts after all." This was said with a brief side glance at Chisame, who simply scoffed at her. "Then, you met, ah, him in London, and you fought the Grand Caster who still remains at large threatening existence as a whole. That's basically all I needed to confirm."

"Um, yeah, although there wasn't that much of a fight, it was him basically stomping all over us," Ritsuka sheepishly admitted. "I'm not sure how will we ever defeat him, but hey, maybe you can help, right? Sensei here said you were the Guardian of Time itself, I assume you are extremely powerful then...?"

"Powerful enough to get time going again, I'd hope," Chisame grouched. "But then again, you haven't done it yet, so...?"

"There's not that much I can do this apay from the Gates, and this incident has separated me from them," the Senshi replied. "Away from my post, I'm not that much more powerful than the rest of the Senshi. Perhaps the Moon Princess, our leader and fated Messiah, could repair the situation if she were here, but..."

"Come on!" Matoi complained. "You aren't frozen yourself, so you have to be immune to this, whatever it is! Can't you fix the rest of the people in the campus?"

"The campus?" Pluto raised an eyebrow. "With very rare exceptions, temporal shifts and alterations aren't localized but universal, Tsunetsuki-san. And I'm not allowed to restart time on my own, I might pay for it with my own life. Even if I succeeded, the consequences could be catastrophic..."

"Allowed by whom?" Satomi inquired. "Who could have authority over your, if you hold such a high rank?"

"I'm not allowed to talk about that either," Pluto coldly said.

"Is it that Princess of the Moon you mentioned?" Asuna took her turn to ask.

"No, she's currently missing. I believe Mercury and the others must have mentioned that to you?"

"Ah, snap, that's right, they were looking for some kind of long lost princess!" Asuna remembered. "And some crystal trinket too, right? Well, I'll assume you're just talking about Skuld's dad, then."

Ritsuka blinked. "Who?"

"Never mind that, you said you wouldn't be here for long, didn't you?" Pluto frowned. "So there's no need for you to learn that much, concern yourself only about what you came to do here. Now, I can tell you this much, Hasegawa-san's conjectures were true. The anomaly we are experiencing is a result of the destruction of Chao Lingshen's device. She has played with rules of nature that should be left untouched, and whenever there are alterations to those already dangerous phenomena, consequences such as this are unavoidable."

"Why weren't we affected by it, though?" Ako asked.

"You were probably too close to the focal point when it happened, and I'm beyond and above Time itself due to my role," the Senshi explained. "That's all there is to know about it."

"I thought you had said these things weren't localized at all, always global," Shirou reminded her.

"No, I did say there were rare exceptions, and this whole ugly affair is a rare exception in itself to begin with. Hmmm," she closely studied the broken watch now in her hand. An advantage, one of the few, she had on Meioh was she was a scientist, and thus had a better understanding of how the mechanical _and_ magical laws of time manipulation worked. "Interesting. The trigger behind this cessation would seem to derive from blunt damage inflicted upon this particular piece of the mechanism. Those are good news. While the ultimate effect was widespread, its source was located in this very precise and diminutive point, and so I might be able to use my power on it without needing to access the Gates."

"Well, then get to work already!" Mordred barked from her corner.

"Not so fast," Pluto said, biting on her lower lip. "I think I still need more power than I have to perform this operation. While it is a small, surgical application of power, it still needs a large concentration of magical energy I'm not sure to have on my own."

"Isn't there a way to get yourself more power for that?" asked Ritsuka.

Pluto sighed. "If the rest of the Sailor Senshi were available, we could simply join hands, lend our combined power on the Senshi needed for the job, and trust her on it. That usually works. But, the way we are right now..."

"Um," another voice said then, "I know of an easy way to power anyone up that only needs you, me, and someone else here with us..."

Pluto flinched in disgust and then glanced back and down, past her shoulder and towards the floor, where a tiny figure sat smirking and busily puffing on a cigarette. "I'm NOT having sex with you, ermine."

Chamo grinned. "You said it, not me, Nee-san!"

* * *

"Ah ha ha, well, that was funny and all, but you know what I'm talking about, Nee-san," Chamo said, now wagging a tiny furry finger. "Someone as knowledgeable as you should—"

"I'm not doing a Pactio with Negi-sensei, either," Pluto shook the idea right off the shelf categorically.

"Definitely no, not at all!" Chisame added.

"Far be it for me to contradict two ladies, so no, I'm sorry!" Negi quickly followed suit.

"What's a Pactio?" Ritsuka asked curiously.

"Oh, that, um," Shirou rasped. "Let's just say it's a way magic users of this would sometime use to infuse partners of their choice with some magical energy, to help them fight. Sometimes, the Pactio will also grant the partner a magical tool or device matching their personality, which is called an Artifact. You could kind of compare it to the purpose of a Noble Phantasm, since they're both trump cards giving you powers beyond the usual magus' range…"

"Wow, that sounds really advantageous!" the other young man said. "I don't think we saw anything like that in any of the other worlds we've visited, do you have one, Emiya-san?"

Shirou grew very uneasy. "Y-You see, Pactios are normally used by wizards, not magi, and in this world mages and magi don't get along that well often, although Sensei's a wizards and he's my good friend, but—"

"That has nothing to do with what he's asking, Shirou," Artoria told him, then explained to Ritsuka, "Shirou and I indeed have a Pactio." She pulled her shiny Card out of her modest cleavage and showed it off, making Mordred's eyes widen behind the helmet. "His starting aptitudes as a Master were somewhat subpar, but this has helped us a lot with our mutual performance."

"Where the hell did you manage to hide that?" Chisame asked.

"Okay, you're lucky my sister isn't here, or she'd definitely make a crack about that," Ritsuka said.

"Master, let's get one of those 'pactios' as well!" Mordred urged, roughly grabbing him by the arm, although not enough as to accidentally hurt him. She still shook him in a rather comical, clumsy way. "If Father took that path, I want to take it as well! Anything he does, I can do better! And if it made him work well with such an obvious pushover, it'd make us unstoppable!"

Her father nodded. "That sounds good. I'd like to measure the strength of your warrior bond against ours."

"Saber, please…!" Shirou clenched his teeth.

"Saber, it's increasingly obvious you're a horrible, horrible parent and this child deserves better," Chisame said blandly.

"See, he's even giving his approval, not that I need it or want it or anything! Hmph!" Mordred kept on shouting at the spiral eyed Ritsuka. "I demand a Pactio right now!"

"Okay, okay, you have my word, I'll give you one as soon as the world stops spinning!" the boy complained, holding his hands up.

Only then did Mordred stopped with a dry chuckle. "Prepare yourself, Father, you're about to be undone at your own twisted game…!"

"You're an idiot," Chisame, Asuna, Pluto and Illya told her as one.

"HEY!" Mordred roared at them.

"What kind of idiot," Illya pressed on, "jumps into a Pactio without even knowing what it implies?! There are many ways to do a Pactio, but the two most effective ones involve either switching blood with each other, which would kill any human who received a transfusion from a Servant—"

Ako blinked several alarmed times. "H-How do you know that for sure?!"

Illya huffed. "Never underestimate the lengths my family went to for research! Anyway, the other most common and workable way involves a kiss in the mouth! You boast of being a real man, so would you kiss your Master in the mouth, huh huh huh?!"

"A-A-A KISS?!" Ritsuka cried out, panicking.

Mordred paused, staring blankly at Illya, before merely shrugging her shoulders. "… I'm okay with that. If it's Master, I'm okay, even though we're both men."

"No way, I don't want to!" Ritsuka protested. "Do you want me killed off by Kiyohime and Tamamo?! Only receiving chocolate during Valentines Day almost resulted in civil war at Chaldea, do you have any idea how bad will it get if you kiss me?!"

"It's okay, I'll protect you, bah! Caster and Berserkers are weak to Sabers, they'll fold like wet tissue," Mordred waved a hand casually. "I'll be even more powerful now, so what's the problem? You can even command them all to kill themselves now, we that won't be needing them anymore!"

"… I think you might be overestimating the advantage a Pactio provides, here…" Negi warned.

"Besides!" Mordred poked a metal-covered finger against the hapless Ritsuka's chest, nearly drilling into it. "You gave your word! No backing away from it, now!"

Artoria nodded solemnly. "That is very true. Those who renege on a promise are the worst of the worst, aren't they, Shirou?"

"Of course they are," the redhead squirmed around uneasily, "but a forced promise is hardly the best standard to help anyone up to!"

"What do you mean it was forced, knave, Master agreed completely out of his own will and without any pressure from me, RIGHT MASTER?!" Mordred bellowed.

"... help…!" Ritsuka squeaked.

Chamo blinked. "Um, I normally only do Pactios for my brother Negi in any case. Not that I mind if you want to kiss each other, but might I suggest you getting yourself another broker for—"

Grave mistake. Mordred's intense stare now was squarely on him. "So you, fey creature, are the one who arranges those alliances between those interested on it?"

"W-Well, yeah, and I get rewarded for it, but still, it's not a mere matter of money for me!" the ermine whined. "It's about making my brother happy, not about prostituting my craft to, no offense, Sir, anyone who passes by—"

"What is prostituting?" Negi asked.

"Don't think about it," Chisame said.

"Yes, I sort of figured, but I had to ask," Negi said.

"You will arrange it or else!" Mordred threatened, pointing Clarent directly at Chamo.

"Y-Yes, Sir, of course I will!" the ermine cried, quickly pulling the chalk out of his fur and starting to work on the circle on the floor.

"Good to see civilized dialogue still yielding results, even in this barbaric and decadent age," Mordred hummed, collapsing her helmet into her armor as Chamo worked frantically… and revealing a beautiful, flawless face identical to that of Artoria.

Shirou's jaw dropped. "But—But you're a—! "

"Shhhhhh!" Ritsuka dove for him, managing to clamp his hands around his mouth right in time. "Do you want to get yourself killed?! Even if my life's doomed now, you should live on, man!"

"Mmm mmm mpphh whhhdyy mmmnnnn?" Emiya frowned, trying to talk around the fingers tightly clamped on his face.

"See, I told you," Chisame privately told Satomi, who was only staring at Mordred's face with very round eyes. "Now remember, free lunches for a full month, if we survive this, okay?"

"Uh… Uh-huh…" Hakase nodded slowly, adjusting her glasses on her face.

"I'd have thought the metal skirt would be a big fat clue," Matoi said, feeling smug on Chisame's behalf.

"Did you know?" Asuna asked Ako.

Ako shrugged. "Well, from the way he behaved, it was clear, wasn't it? Then again, it also was very clear he didn't want that to be brought up, and I'm making a habit of never arguing against people with very big swords, you included, so…"

Mordred huffed. "While I appreciate the efforts for not directly addressing the matter of my gender, just alluding to it that shiftily also gets on my nerves. Stop it right now, that is my only warning."

"Okay, fine, buddy, whatever floats your boat," Asuna calmly said, her hands up while Ako made a gesture of meekly zipping her own mouth up. "Um, I think you're very cool anyway! You should meet this butt kicking swordsgirl who looks really nice in a suit…"

"Be quiet!" Mordred barked.

* * *

"Well, it's done, get onto it so my bro can kiss the lovely cougar already..." Chamo sighed, stepping away from the finished glowing circle on the floor.

"I'm not kissing anyone today!" Sailor Pluto insisted.

Negi blinked at his friend. "Why are you calling her a cougar? Is that supposed to be flattering?"

"Don't think about it," Chisame, Satomi, Shirou and Saber sighed.

"Good God, for a professor you sure are an ignorant child," Mordred sneered, all but pushing him aside while also all but pulling Ritsuka onto the circle with her, arranging his trembling frame so they were face to face now. Only now did she blush and huff angrily. "W-Well? You're the Master, take the initiative!"

"O-Okay, I want to take the initiative on both of us moving away from this very bad idea!" Ritsuka quickly said.

"Masterrrrr!" Mordred growled. "What would your sister say if she saw you now? She's more of a man than you are!"

"Interesting choice of words, coming from you," Illya slyly observed. "But anyway, yeah, we want to see a kiss too! Right, Berserker, right, Sayoko? Kiss, kiss, kiss!" she began pumping her small fist around.

"Grwl, grwl, grwl!" Berserker also shook his fist around, if only to go along with what Illya was doing.

"I'm not sure I like the implications of this whole chain of revelations on the background of my adoptive country, but if Ojou-sama wishes for it, you would better do it, Fujimaru-san," Sayoko faint and sweetly smiling, mechanically pumping her fist.

"Hm, I'm with whatever the huge strongman who never dies no matter what happens," Asuna nodded. "Wow, saying that almost made me throw up for some reason. I wonder why?"

"That's certainly a wise way of looking at it, Asuna-san," Matoi said with a nod.

"I'm starting to think we should leave this dimension to the King of Magic," Ritsuka confessed, staring blandly at the small group. "You're going to explain this to Kiyohime, you hear me?! A-Anyway, I have something to tell you, Mordred, I've never kissed anyone before!"

"Oh, what a radical, stunning surprise!" Illya snarked with a little chortle.

Mordred tilted her head, also looking surprise. "Really? I'd have thought that your sister would– "

Solemnly, Ritsuko put both hands on Mordred;s shoulder, giving her a very intense look. "Don't. Go. There. I have never kissed anyone before, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it, got it Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl?-!"

"Don't call me that, I look absolutely nothing like Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl," Mordred said, miffed.

"That was the actual name of an actual knight?" Chisame said, aghast. "How the HELL did ANY of you manage to hide who you were with names like that?"

"Inexperience should pose no problem," Artoria said, "Shirou had never kissed anyone either when we did it, and yet he proved to be rather good at it. As long as the spirit is willing, any obstacle can be overcome..."

"My spirit is not willing, my spirit doesn't want my body to die violently yet!" Ritsuka protested.

Mordred looked at Artoria. "Father. In this, you have the experience I lack. This is the sole field where I shall ever admit inferiority to you, and hence the only one where I shall ever ask, nay, demand, for guidance from you! As lacking a parent as you ever were, at least prove yourself at this! Show me how it's done, Father!"

"Gladly, I shall assume this duty," Artoria nodded, her tone solemn right before she grabbed both Mordred and Ritsuka by the hair and slammed their mouths together. "For Camelot...!"

"What a horrible way to kiss," Matoi felt the need to comment.

"An awful parent, definitely one of the worst I've ever seen!" Chisame yelled as the Pactio circle erupted in a massive burst of light.

Negi looked aside, huffing. "Well, I never needed to bother _my_ father so he could tell me how to kiss someone...!"

Shirou smiled proudly. "Were you a natural as well, Sensei? Now I know _I_ was! And from Queen Guinevere, no less! I compare myself favorably to King Arthur, who would've known...!"

"Shirou, for the last time, I'm Arthur, Guinevere was my wife!" Saber roared as she finally pulled her hands away, and Mordred and her Master, now in more than one sense, dumbly staggered back from each other, a shiny card appearing in the air between them.

* * *

"I wonder how will I be killed…" Ritsuka mused sadly to himself. "Skewered with a naginata? Stabbed through the stomach with a knife… no, a dagger, maybe? Maybe I'll be tied to two chariots of horses and pulled apart…? Fed Infinite Pancake until I contract diabetes?"

"Wanderer-san, don't say those horrible things in front of Negi-sensei, he already has enough trauma in him," Chisame scolded him while Negi helpfully produced a duplicate of the new card for the actually thankful Mordred. "Listen, if you're a Master, you must have Command Seals for all those Servants, right? Just tell the most troublesome ones, 'Don't kill me', I don't think they'll want to vanish after you're gone anyway…"

"I wouldn't be so sure, many famous legendary figures are well known for throwing their lives away over fleeting passions," Sailor Pluto reminded her, making Ritsuka nod in depressed agreement. "Never mind that now, see this?" She held up the broken watch for the others to see, showing off how a few scrambled pieces of it had somehow pulled back together, although still leaving the rest of its contents a wrecked mess. "The magical energy unleashed by the Pactio seems to have had a regenerative effect on some components of the time manipulation device."

"How does that even make the slightest smidgen of sense?" Satomi asked, frowning.

"Magic?" Chisame said. "Honestly, I'd have thought you'd sense the theme by now."

Pluto shrugged. "Servants have a strong link to the timestream, as their essences were plucked from beyond it and their actions basically shaped the course of history. Something like this had never been tried before—the need and circumstances were never there before this—but I believe there's a good chance the pulses resulting from forging an alliance with a Servant, when in close proximity with Lingshen's machine, infuse it with enough energy as to activate its self-repair systems."

"That still doesn't make any sense!" Chisame said while Asuna only scratched her head cluelessly. "And that thing has a self-repair system, since when?! You never said anything about that! Why hadn't it worked before this then?!"

"Because time itself was stopped. Something can't possibly work when there's no passage of time to allow the process to happen, can it?" Pluto asked, in an almost condescending tone that further irritated Chisame. "I can only suppose the self-repairs were intended to work with less extensive damage that wouldn't stop the flow of time altogether, but who knows whatever goes through Linghsen's mind at any given time?"

"Actually, considering how accident prone Sensei is, I think that was very clever from Chao," Satomi pointed out.

"Perhaps," Pluto conceded, "but now we could see if the procedure works again. I'd suggest finding more of your Servants and seeing if they can provide similar prana bursts to fuel the watch's self-repair, Ritsuka-san."

"Can't you just kiss the kid instead?" Fujimaru made a truly miserable face.

"Can't he just kiss Berserker?" Illya suggested, perhaps a bit too into the idea all of a sudden. Twisted little thing. "He's so powerful, maybe he'll not only fix the watch all at once, but also turn it into an awesome flying Delorean!"

 _ **"GRRRWWWWLLL!"**_ Heracles shook his head vigorously, for once refusing to go along with his Master's suggestion. He had standards, after all.

Ritsuka went ghastly pale. "Kill me!" he begged, throwing himself at Matoi's feet and hugging her legs.

Matoi blinked innocently. "Do I look like the most murder-prone person in this room, Fujimaru-san…?"

"Oh, we'll just kiss again, what's the big deal?" Mordred grinned cheekily, waving her new Card around. It depicted her in full armor but without the helmet, holding Clarent firmly, and under the image it read _SABER- Mordred Pendragon- Eques Prævaricatrix_. "Look, look, Master, isn't this cool? It acknowledges me as a Pendragon and everything, I was right all along!"

"I never said you weren't a Pendragon, just that you were unfit to rule," Artoria intervened, stonefaced. "Your mother was as much of a child of Uther as I was, and she wasn't worthy of the throne either…"

Shirou was supporting himself on a sympathetic Ako who fanned him with a magazine from 1999. "… and there was incest, too, my God… I wish she'd never told me…"

"What's–?" Negi began, that raised a hand as everyone opened their mouth. "Never mind, I can already guess."

"He's catching on," Chisame said. "Not actually getting smarter though."

"I wonder if you'd be as talented at fellatio too?" Asuna mused, causing Ritsuka's head to snap up. "Saber-san is supposed to be a natural at it."

"Eh? Father, you did such a thing?" Mordred said, for the first time actually looking shocked and staring at her father in surprise. "A natural talent, you say? Master! Whip it out, I need to see if–!"

"DON'T YOU DARE!" Saber cried, red-faced, her bad-parenting cool for once broken.

"You can't tell me what to do!" Mordred cried. "If I want to see if I have a natural talent for fellatio too, than I can if I want to! I'll show you, I will also surpass you in this! Master, assist me!"

"Please leave me out of this," Ritsuka said in a small voice.

"There, there, be strong will you, Sempai?" Ako softly said, patting him on the back and taking pity on him after everything Artoria had revealed to him over the last few minutes.

Also taking some measure of pity on Ritsuka, Pluto coughed delicately into a fist. "For the purposes of the best compatibility between Master and Ministra, Einzbern-san, I'd say Fujimaru-san should go look for his own Servants instead of seizing yours."

 _ **"GRRRRNNNFFFFF,"**_ Heracles agreed with a decisive single nod.

Illya pouted. "But, those guys must be like statues now, too! Isn't that creepy as well, going around kissing unconscious people? What is this, a Grimm fairy tale?"

Pluto smiled. "Oh, if the damage brought upon the watch was partially repaired, there's a good chance several individuals, mostly those related to the source of the magical energy, were released from the time stasis as well. And if they weren't, there might be a solid chance you could still summon them to your side, Fujimaru-san, by merely—"

Then the Servants all tensed up and suddenly pulled their Masters aside, Negi doing the same for Satomi and Ako, and Matoi for Chisame. Asuna and Sayoko simply jumped to safety on their own, as something huge and monstrous crashed into the room from the outside, breaking through another wall of the infirmary, and landing on Ako's desk, destroying it into so many pieces.

"WAH!" Izumi cried. "What, what's that?! And why did it have to land on my desk?-!"

"Orphan!" Negi hissed, chanting his activation key under his breath and helping Ako and Satomi back to their feet while readying his staff. "They'd been laying low for a while…!"

"What, what's one of them doing here, and NOW?!" Chisame protested, readying her scepter as well. "I thought these things were supposed to be nocturnal and, I don't know, paralyzed just like everyone else?!"

The Orphan rose, a massive, gelatinous purple blob sprouting several tendrils of several different lengths. It had small blinking eyes all over its surface and oozed a thick mucus that quickly spread across the floor, pulsating and bubbling as if gifted with life of its own. From the hole in the wall, another identical Orphan could be seen, peeking into the room and trying to squeeze in. Artoria frowned and prepared both her invisible sword and her water gun, while Mordred grinned and cockily swung Clarent in swift, roughly skilled circles. Ako whimpered at the damage did the other furniture in the room. Satomi took a deep breath in and summoned her metal arms, mashing her gigantic fists together in preparation of her own.

"This is bad," Ritsuka gulped. "I take it this is your local variety of Monsters? When the Grand Caster's forces go anywhere, they usually take control of the realm's monstrous species and use them to eradicate humans and fight us. Wyverns, dragons, griffins, Twitards, trolls, all it's the same for them, they can seize them just as easily…"

"You don't say, that's easier than just bothering to go around hiring goons, I guess," Asuna forced a smile, her harisen changing into her Ensis Exorcisans at her mental command. She was inwardly thrilled, it had been so easy this time…!

"Actually, they do that as well. But enough of that!" Mordred shouted, leaping forward and cutting cleanly through the Orphan's body, passing right through it and slicing it in two. Both halves of the monster fell in opposite directions as the mucus it left on Mordred's armor upon contact with it sizzled, burning away at the suit's surface. "Geez… This is going to be one of those, isn't it…"

The bisected Orphan twitched, and both halves rose again, tentacles squirming around once more, lashing out with them violently in all directions. Meanwhile, the Orphan outside also tried to push its way in, only to be blasted into bits when Sailor Pluto aimed with her staff and whispered a _"Dead Scream"_ at it from behind Heracles. Christmas Cake, crankly old cougar she was, but she was still a magical girl and filled with the instinctive dread of tentacled things. However, almost immediately, the tiny chunks of Orphan left began moving around, easily flowing into the room as Ako fought the urge to faint on the spot. Her floors…!

Around the small building, pushing through the frozen crowds when not outright absorbing them into their malleable bodies, more of said Orphans approached, surrounding the corralled active humans from every corner. Looking quickly through both large holes, Negi counted a dozen of them already and swallowed the knot in his throat, mounting his staff. "We might have to fly out of here, Chisame, and attack them from above. Saber-san, and, um, Saber-san, you try to stall them at ground level while I—"

"TSUBAME GAESHI!"

 _"Wishing to blossom, visibly in the open! Dancing, to blossom in full glory! Passing through, Guillotine Breaker!"_

The two new cries that apparently had arrived out of nowhere couldn't be any more different from each other, and yet Ritsuka seemed to immediately recognize them the same, his face showing great relief while Mordred's twitched in annoyance. Negi blinked in shock as several Orphans seemed to just vanish in blurs of sliced and blasted tiny fragments that couldn't even reform, and then, where the Orphan currently the closest to the building had been, he could see two figures, one standing, the other mounting some manner of glowing colorful horse. Both had large holes burned into their clothes but stood proud and mighty, defiant even, and it would have been easy even for a casual passerby to understand why Ritsuka was pumping a fist at their triumphant arrival. "Assassin! Rider! Oh yeah, you're okay, this is so good!"

"So… who's that one?" Shirou asked Artoria while pointing at the petite, smiling beauty on the magical horse. "Agravain? Lancelot? Percival? Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Film?"

"Oh, don't be like that! Not all of us were women!" Saber chided him, then shrugged. "There were some men, too…"

"Some?!"

"Could we please discuss this at a later date, Shirou?! Preferably after I'm gone?!" she proposed.

* * *

Elsewhere in the wide, wide campus, Zazie Rainyday quietly sat on a large crate next to the colorful, slightly sinister big top of the Nightmare Circus, juggling a set of twelve balls without even actually looking at them. She didn't feel like putting in any effort today.

A paralyzed little bird sat on her head, wings half-unfurled, tiny beak half-open, as it had been when it was stopped in the middle of a happy chirp and fluttering... what, minutes ago? Hours, perhaps? Zazie wasn't too sure herself, she had the impression she had a little missing time of her own, so perhaps she had also been frozen in time, or time was frozen for her, same difference, for a while as well.

Well, she guessed such things were always a possibility when people started tampering with the fabric of time like Negi-sensei and Chao, but that was something they would have to sort out on their own if they were to prove themselves worthy of the next stages in their personal development. Zazie saw no good reason to involve herself personally just yet, and speaking on that subject...

"No," she said as she felt two massive bloblike Orphans sneaking up on her from behind.

The Orphans, flinching back with a curious, soft blubbering sound, screeched something erratic and spastic that sounded like schizophrenic iron claws on a large chalkboard.

Zazie still didn't bother looking back. "I said no," she repeated herself, just as calm as before. "Look elsewhere."

She felt the Orphans pulling back and retreating, which actually made her sort of glad. Orphans rarely listened at all, unless they had a HiME making them into CHILDs, and at the same time, she disliked being forced to slay them unless it was absolutely necessary. Of course, their quick obedience couldn't mean she was off the hook so easily, and so she sighed, waiting patiently for whoever was in the next step of this process to show themselves.

She didn't have to wait long. A man's cultured, rich voice soon spoke from behind her. "You know what I am. Don't you?"

"I guess," Zazie said, knowing better than to let her verbal tic slip just yet. "Shouldn't you be dead, American President Cosplayer?"

"I come from beyond."

"Ah," she said. She understood what he truly meant perfectly, since he had only said 'from beyond' and not 'from THE beyond'.

"Your blood also runs through our Demon Pillars, Princess," the man's voice appealed to her. "We would hate to go against you, so we dearly hope you won't oppose us by choosing to defend... the reign of men."

Now Zazie finally looked back over her shoulder with icy golden eyes as she easily set all the balls aside one after another. Care must be taken with one's equipment, after all. "It's not me you should come to, but Mother. She deals in human suffering and desire alike, those will be difficult to exploit once you have incinerated history."

"There are more than enough other sapient races in this universe," the smiling man in the expensive, yet tacky suit and top hat reminded her. Honestly, he looked like Abraham Lincoln. "They were there and will continue there long before and after the times of man. And despite their claims, they are just as exploitable in the ways of sin. No, no matter how much your race pretends Earth is the most important of all their properties, they all know they are expendable, hardly going to war for against Ars Goetia. All of them but you, Princess. You are the one who loves-"

"That," Zazie interrupted, in a subtly threatening tone, "sounds like too strong a term for my feelings on the matter, poyo."

Lev Lynor Flauros laughed heartily. "Sorry, sorry! I've always been at a loss on how to treat young ladies of your position." Then he stepped back as more Orphans materialized around him, all lurching ominously towards the dark skinned, unfazed girl. She pulled her long, sharp claws out without a word. "You know, of course, we can destroy you and leave this plane of reality before even your mother can chase us within her jurisdiction," he casually commented, lightly tugging on the lapels of his dress jacket.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that, poyo," she stood up majestically, cracking her neck aside. "She's fast, poyo. Almost as much as I, poyo."

The man sneered before stepping back and out of sight altogether. "Kill her," he commanded, and then the Orphans lunged on her savagely, all at once.

With no sound but that of her claws cutting through the air and then them, the young woman welcomed them.

* * *

"Dammit!" Chisame said as she blasted another Orphan through with an electric blast from her scepter, which only resulted in drilling a large hole through it and slowing it down a little. "They only regenerate from any harm, we aren't getting anywhere this way!"

They had taken the fight out of Ako's infirmary, leaving the poor Izumi hiding under a barricade of chairs, and then made the monsters chase them away into a currently closed auditorium, where that night a few conferences would take place. It was the best and closest place where they could have a major battle without getting any of the immobilized Festival goers killed off (or pssobily just trampled, since there was not time for them to get hurt in), and thankfully it had worked at that, but that still left them no closer to destroying the twelve gathered Orphans for good at all.

Even Berserker's brute force, while very effective at keeping Illya and Sayoko out of harm's way, aided in some small part by the ninja maid throwing sharp daggers at what little the beast-like man missed, did not provide a conclusive end to any of what he bashed and smashed, leading to a prolonged stalemate from their side. Sure, they exploded quite messily and all over the place, but that did not stop them from reforming. He just did it faster and messier. Illya didn't seem to mind, however, clearly amused by the display of violence and giggling cutely at it while sitting back and relaxing.

Negi breathed out in frustration after shocking another Orphan to burnt, sizzling chunks, only to watch it slowly come together afterwards. "I'll have to ask Master teach me a few ice spells later," he decided. "Freezing them should work..."

"Isn't this funny?" Mordred mused aloud. "The only ones who'd be better frozen in place are the only ones freely roaming around just to bother us, heh. but I know of something that should get rid of them for good! Father!" she called out.

Artoria nodded at her. "Yes. good thinking. But, we need to get everyone else out of the way first..."

"What are you going to do?" asked the pony-tailed Assassin guy, briefly pausing after slicing another Orphan and dispersing its segments around with a few more slashes of his katana. Negi noticed that, while his sword technique was very different from Setsuna's, it was, if anything, even more effective, probably even as good as Eishun's, from what little the boy had seen of it. He moved from one place to the next so fast it was as if it ceased to be in one spot and then simply reappeared in the other, with no apparent motion in the middle.

Artoria sighed, gesturing at the others to fall back behind her and Mordred, who had stood side by side readying their weapons. "My identity is no secret anymore, so let the Sword of the Promised Victory sing freely! Move towards the door, everyone!"

"Hm, well, whatever you say, fine," Asuna gulped, cleaving off a few tentacles moving her way; while her blade dealt longer lasting damage to these magical creatures than anything else the team could dish out so far, the Orphans eventually grew back from that as well. Negi and Satomi were currently theorizing, each on their own, the Orphans' healing factor was tied to their biology more closely than to their magical origins.

As a matter of fact, the door was one of the few parts of the auditorium still standing, and Chisame had a feeling the whole building would come down if they kept up this fight for much longer. Rider's shiny crystal horse kicked another Orphan into the position signaled by Saber, and Chisame blasted another so it moved closer to the rest as well. Artoria nodded thoughtfully, as by now all twelve recovering, dazed creatures were more or less gathered in close proximity, and her allies had fallen back behind her and her son, close enough to the door for an escape.

Emiya's Servant closed her eyes and chanted, quiet and controlled, " _O mighty wind..."_

Mordred grinned cruelly, with a flash in her green eyes. She chanted as well, her voice clearly different from her father's, but not as much as her tone. Her blade began to crackle with fiercely shifting crimson lightning all over its surface. " _Demonic sword of calamity! Come forth!"_

Artoria's sword was almost fully visible now, its lines classic and sleek, elegant and conventional, yet unmistakably lethal and unopposable. While nowhere as big as Asuna's blade, it was just as impressive in its own way. _"The torrent of life shines..."_

Not to be outdone, Mordred growled, raising her blade forward, which seemed to seep thick blood from the hilt as the crimson lightning grew even bigger and more intense, as if mirroring her inner bubbling rage. " _This for sure will be the wicked blade that will destroy my father!"_

And with a final explosion of mana, Artoria's own sword revealed itself in full, managing to shine even under the immobilized light of the sun painted on the sky, filtering through the large holes on the walls and ceiling. Shirou's eyes grew very large and starry. _It was so beautiful...!_

Roaring in mad release, even though sharp, rattling waves of pain rippled through her body from the effort, Mordred's weapon vomited its enhanced fury, only further empowered by her recent Alliance, and the need to prove herself in front of the only two people she cared about. " _Take this! CLARENT BLOOD ARTHUR!"_

 _"Take this!"_ the King shouted as well. " _EXCALIBUR!"_

Negi stirred within in an indescribable mixture of raw emotions in the split second before he just leapt back, pushing as many of his comrades with himself as he could, screaming a desperate "NO!" as they stumbled back out of the building that seemed to simply explode from the inside...

* * *

Zazie Rainyday stood panting and breathing heavily, already small garments shredded and half-melted, over the bubbling, liquefied remains of the Orphans by her big top, her claws still fully deployed. That was how her older sister found her when she finally came across her, carelessly strolling around the grounds at her own leisure in her skimpy tiger print bikini.

As with Professor Lev, Rainyday noticed her presence without needing to look back at her. "Are you involved with this, poyo?" she asked, making a point of keeping the claws out.

"Well, 'good morning, it's been a while, nice to see you again' to you too, Sis! You're looking more naked than usual. Is that the 3-A influence?" the bronzed half-goddess, half-demon said, taking another sip from her can of Ebisu. "Who sent those, the First District? I doubt they'd aim at you, that's a bit high for their reach; not to mention-"

"Ars Goetia, poyo," Zazie coldly stared back at her over her shoulder.

Urd blinked. "Ahh-hhhhh. Isn't that an impossibility in this continuum, tho'?"

"From another dimension, poyo."

"Oh, figures!" Urd rolled her green eyes around. "When a group breaks through, it's just a matter of time before others do, it's always the same crap. I told Peorth we should've reinforced the barriers better, but then again, without the kid... Anyway, no, I don't have anything to do with this, shouldn't you know me better than that by now?"

"Loyalties can always change fast and swift, poyo," Zazie pondered, discarding her ruined top and opening another crate to begin rummaging through it. "Then what brought you here, poyo?"

"I thought I'd drop by to try and stop your classmate from doing her thing now that she's dragged Skuld into it, but in hindsight that was a bad idea, so now I'm just enjoying myself," Urd shrugged while Poyo pulled out another top and fastened it around her chest. "Bell was always right, humans should learn their lessons on their own. Well, not that it'll stop me from giving a few of them a small push here and there, but for the big picture..."

"Forget that, poyo," her sister turned around to face her. "Ars Goetia's intervention has just rendered whatever Chao planned to do this time meaningless in comparison, poyo."

"Eh, I wouldn't be that fast to say that," Urd disagreed. "But yeah, if they really are here-"

"They are, poyo. I just spoke with the Second Lieutenant right here, poyo."

"- then that adds a whole new ugly layer onto all of this," Urd sighed. "You want to contact your teacher now, don't you?"

"No, poyo. Not yet, poyo."

"Oh, then you sure expect me to pull your part around for you, while keeping your own nature and plans a secret from them, right? Typical. No wonder Mom chose you over me."

"As I recall, it was you who chose your Father over our Mother, poyo."

The two dark skinned beauties stared silently into each other's eyes before Urd gave another annoyed sigh. "I guess I owe you at least that much, but don't let this become a habit, okay? And no, I'm not going to tsundere on you, so don't hold your breath."

Poyo only nodded in silence.

"What?" Urd grunted. "Aren't you even going to say 'thanks'?"

"I don't believe on speaking through lies, poyo. I'd rather keep silence on truths, poyo."

"Well, at least in _that_ , you are just like Za-chan, kid..." Urd, said, then because she had her position as big sister to uphold, added, "not so much in the chest area, though."

"Go drink yourself into a stupor and die, poyo," Zazie said.

* * *

"Th-There wasn't anyone we didn't see in that building, was there?" Negi dubiously pointed at the gigantic pile of rubble. "I mean, no one setting things up for tonight in the back, or-?"

"Even if there were," Sailor Pluto sighed, dusting herself off elegantly, "as soon as the watch is repaired, it should take us back in time to the moment of its activation, so these disastrous events won't come to pass in the first place. Frankly, I'm surprised that happened. With time stopped there should have been no time for the building to be destroyed at all."

"Servants can kick the asses of anything," Ritsuka said authoritatively. "Even time isn't a shield if they _really_ want your ass kicked."

"Oh!" Negi sighed. "So those poor Orphans won't die then..."

Illya stared harshly at him. "Are you even feeling sorry for those inhuman things?!"

Negi shrugged. "Fujimaru-san mentioned they had to be under their enemy's control, didn't he? Can we really say this was their own fault then?"

"Even left to their own devices, these creatures will still hunt and prey on anyone venturing into their territories, Sensei," Satomi reminded him.

"Well, yes, but mostly as long as we stay out of their habitats, they'll know better than to venture past our defenses, in that they're pretty much like wild animals... Oh, sorry!" he quickly bowed towards Assassin and Rider then, snapping both Servants out of the conversation they had been having with Ritsuka on the sidelines. "I neglected introducing ourselves properly before, that's simply unforgivable! Please, Rider-san, Assassin-san, meet Hasegawa Chisame and Hakase Satomi, my students, and Tsunetsuki Matoi, student to one of my best friends. I'm Professor Negi Springfield, and I... well, I also teach Saber-san here..." he pointed at Artoria, currently arguing with Mordred on who had unleashed the biggest blast of monster-pulverizing power a close distance away, the faint cry of 'I hate you!' echoing towards them.

"Oh, _enchante!_ " the incredibly graceful and delicate Rider bowed gently and with so much ladylike, flawless charm Negi couldn't help but be briefly taken aback. The normally oblivious Hakase and jaded Chisame took notice, blushing slightly at this person's overwhelming radiance. Even Matoi couldn't stop herself from going _JIIIIIII_ for a moment or two before vigorously slapping her own cheeks muttering to herself about Chisame-sama, pulling a suspiciously lacy triangle from her pocket and rubbing it on her face a few times before tucking it away. "I am Servant Rider, so pleased to make your acquaintance, always at your service, estimated young _Professeur_!"

The man next to her quietly coughed into a fist. "Marie-dono, please do remember you promised you'd try to be less formal and more approachable to locals in the Singularities..."

"Oh, that's right, my apologies!" she gasped with a small hand on her mouth, before graciously bowing to Negi's team again, making Chamo swoon and faint, mostly because he could see up her skirt, and she apparently predated the invention of panties. "I'll try and introduce myself again, the way you modern people like best, right? Ahem. Ah. Yes. Here goes... Wh… Whassup! My Homies! It's me, Marie Antoinette!" she smiled, just as beautifully but now waving in a way that tried to be casual and only managed being impossibly clumsy and cute at once.

Negi's cheeks grew redder, and he gripped his staff tightly. "H-Hello... I mean...!" he managed before his English soul rebelled at realizing he'd just been charmed by a Frenchwoman. Then he remembered she was actually Austrian by birth and calmed down.

"... there's something very scary but also very soothing about you, I'm not sure I like it..." Chisame quietly confessed.

"I, I think I do, um, in a perfectly rational and merely friendly fashion, that is for sure..." Satomi reassured. "Sorry, ah, what were we just talking about now in the first place...?"

* * *

"See, this is proof my blast killed more of them than yours!" Mordred jammed a pointed finger on the small screen of the cellphone a stonefaced Illya was holding between Artoria and her. "You can clearly see mine was bigger and covered more range! We can discuss whether that was because of our own capacities or our Masters', but the fact still remains!"

"All I can see there," Artoria honestly replied, squinting at the blur of colors in the pic Illya had managed to snap right before Berserker pulled her to safety, "is a massive blotch of primary colors, one not necessarily indicative of the final results, but if victory at this petty subject sets your heart at ease, I shall concede defeat..."

"You should, since I won, no two ways around it, and it's not petty at all, you're just jealous!" Mordred snapped before telling Illya. "Print a copy for me, I must have a memento of this moment for posterity..."

"I'm not your personal photographer, you know," Illya mumbled before saving the image for later printing anyway. There was much she wished to know about this 'Chaldea' yet, and maybe she couldn't just make Berserker beat the info out of those clowns for her. Mainly because whatever Berserker would beat on wouldn't be in any form to speak at all afterwards, ever. Then she looked back at where her brothers were talking with the two new Servants. "By the way, who are those?"

"Oh, nobody worth remembering, only a wandering spirit who took anothers name and a pampered queen of France," Mordred said before starting walking that way. "Hey, Sasaki!" she called out. "Any idea where the others are right now? There's something I want to show Kiyohime and the jackal, mwahahaha!"

"Oh, Mordred-dono," the ponytailed man looked her way. "You are in good spirits, I see. No, regrettably we know nothing on the subject. We woke up near a house two districts away and made our way here, hoping you'd be drawn to this location as well. But this is more interesting than anything else!" he noted with a smile, eyeing the scowling Artoria. "There is another of the Lion King in this realm, after all!"

"Well, yes, there's one everywhere we go, isn't there?" Mordred huffed. "However, I have a hunch this is my actual father! He is the perfect image of the one from my memories! No Santa Claus fetish! No humongous, grotesque chest! No Grail corruption! The correct age and maturity, and his memories of our bitter fallout match mine exactly, isn't that wonderful?!"

Shirou frowned dubiously. "You... You're happy to share bloody memories of betrayal and death with your father?"

Mordred shrugged. "It's all we have, so I'll gladly take it regardless." Negi nodded in agreement, looking up with a look that was both wistful and traumatized.

"No, it's not all we share," Artoria disagreed, "if you were to look past our differences, perhaps you would properly appreciate the good moments we had together."

"Those mostly involved bloody carnage in fields of battle as well," Mordred reminded her.

Negi sighed. "Sir Mordred is so lucky to have so many wonderful memories with their father."

"Okay, seriously, we have to get you to a therapist," Chisame said. "You're English, there's no stigma with you."

"I never heard you complaining then!" Artoria pointed out.

"Of course not, it was all I wished for!" Mordred protested. Negi moaned with envy. "But, what I mean is... Oh, never mind! Well, Master, what are we going to do now? Wait until more of these fiends and their Master show up, so we can solve the riddle of this Singularity at last?"

"Shouldn't he," Illya pointed at Ritsuka, who flinched instantly, "go on and kiss the next two Servants so we can settle this time anomaly like the old woman in the improper skirt said? This is starting to be as pointlessly long as the extended flashback."

"I'm not even thirty yet!" Sailor Pluto lied in outrage.

Assassin raised an eyebrow. "Kiss?"

"I don't understand this," Rider confessed, blinking adorably. "Is this related to part of the customs of this region?"

"Allow me, please, your Pristine Majesty of Unmatched Beauty!" Chamo quickly offered, pulling his piece of chalk out and beginning to draw a helpful schematic of instructions on the wood of a nearby tree. Rider's small mouth went open like a very pretty round 'O', impressed by his frantic drawing speed. "Nobody can explain these weighty, wonderful issues to royalty better than this humble but hard working emissary of the world of magic, I'm sure you'll understand everything immediately, and, hasn't anyone ever told you lovely French ladies and adorable young Welsh gentlemen make for the best partners in any magic related enterprise...?"

"She's Austrian by birth," Negi corrected. "She was just unfortunately cursed to live in France."

Rider blinked, then looked helplessly at Mordred. "Please help me? I have no idea what he's ranting about, and I have the feeling it'll only get worse!"

Mordred grinned cockily at her, waving her card on her face. "And you'd be right, but don't worry, it's rather simple when you strip all the bells and whistles away. See this little thing here? Well, I just got it from Master that way, confirming me as the first among his Servants. You've been always nice to me, so I guess I can let you be my Number Two..."

"Isn't this the part where you as a parent need to warn your kid about the dire consequences of letting their partner make out with someone else?" Chisame said to Arturia.

"I'm sure Mordred would like nothing better than to match my experiences being cuckolded and falling into disaster," Saber said stoically.

"You're awfulness as a parent just keeps on rising, doesn't it?" Chisame said, honestly astonished her opinion of the Servant was managing to drop so low.

Ritsuka stared miserably at Shirou now. "You said you wanted to be a hero more than anything else, didn't you? Well, sometimes all a hero can do for a doomed victim is shortening their misery! So please, I know I'm asking for a lot, but-!"

Shirou sighed. "Oh please, stop overreacting so much! Why are all men who have deal with multiple women at a time like this? Sorry to tell you this, but good thing I'm not one of you...!"

* * *

Ako sighed as she swept the wreckage of her poor, devastated infirmary, shaking her head to herself. "Honestly," she told the paralyzed guy she had placed on one of the beds after the fallout from the fight had toppled him over, shortly before Negi-sensei and the others managed to move the fight away from the area, "things like this make you wonder how close we are at any given time to total disaster when we ignore everything about the world of magic, right?"

She took a moment to pick up a fallen portrait of the Headmaster from the floor and put it back in its place before returning to sweeping. "I mean, what if one of those times I knew nothing about magic, one of these magical crises had killed everyone at the Academy? Do you think that makes it worse, or better? I think it's kind of bad, not even getting to know why your life was wasted away, but at the same time, whew, these things are a load to know about..."

She looked around, trying to decide how much effort was worth putting on this. There was no way she could fix everything back in the event undoing the timestop didn't just undo everything, but at the same time she couldn't just sit back and let everything stay the same; she had to do whatever she could to at the very least, leave a few things in place for the cleanup crews to have an easier time, they had to be people too, right? Unless they were magical constructs, or animated dolls, or something like that, but even dolls had feelings, if Karakuri-san was any indication, so...

Then a manly voice spoke from behind her, startling her. "Don't worry. Your life won't be wasted."

Ako yelped, spinning back and instinctively raising her broom in a defensive stance, facing the tall, smiling man who had just appeared in the room, wearing a fine if very outdated suit, a top hat, and the most ridiculous sideburns she'd ever seen. "Wh-Who are you?!" she gasped. "Are you a friend of that count, Wilhelm, or maybe that Jadeite guy, or-"

"No, no, not at all child," he shook his head, taking his hat off and bowing. "But you could say I'm not that different, nature-wise, from the good Count. Professor Lev Lainur Flauros, at your service. And you at ours, I'm sure."

Ako began quickly backing away for the closest hole out, sweating intensely. "D-D-Don't come any closer, my friends must be about to get back, and they are very-"

"Exactly. That's why I want you, my dear young lady," the man easily agreed, taking a single, long reaching step forward and easily taking hold of Ako. "Don't be afraid. You'll see them again soon enough."

Ako sighed, not that it would have helped all that much, and had a sudden strong surge of empathy for Chisame. "Excuse me sir, am I being kidnapped?"

"Why, yes, my dear girl," the man said, turning to drag her out.

"Is this the sort of kidnapping where I'm bait and people are supposed to find out I've been taken or the other kind where I'm a complication or something?"

"Oh, definitely the former, you have nothing I need otherwise."

"In that case, can we flip the sign to say the doctor is out? We run a neat infirmary here."

"... sure, all right."

* * *

"Hm! Hm! Hm hm hm, I see..." Rider said, cutely rubbing on her small chin, her lower lip pouting up in a way indicative of deep royal thinking. "So that's the way it is, what do you think of it, _Monsieur_ Sasaki?"

"If I must be forthcoming with my opinion on the matter," Assassin answered, "I shall say it barely makes any sense when explained that way, although there are too many specific matters in areas beyond this one's ken for one such as I to judge them properly. Still, I do understand the basics of it, that Master needs to kiss us to prod Time itself into running properly..."

"N-Not you, please, Assassin!" Ritsuka quickly blurted out.

Assassin paused. "... so be it, then," he finally said. "But, surely your reaction would be different if Astolfo-dono stood here instead of I?"

"Wha-What's that got to do with anything, no, I wouldn't k-kiss his delicate, small and pink lips that surely are very soft either!" Fujimaru babbled, waving his hands before himself.

"..." Matoi, Chamo, Chisame, Satomi, Asuna, Pluto, and even Shirou and Negi said.

"No, really, I wouldn't! N-Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I'm not that way for any guy, not even Astolfo, you'd understand if you knew Astolfo, I mean, you would understand why I'd be tempted, but I'm not, really!" Ritsuka stuttered in mounting panic.

"... okay, no one's said anything, no need to react like that..." Shirou carefully said.

"I'm British, we're cool with benders," Negi said.

"To each his own, more girls for the rest of us, then," Chamo shrugged.

"B-But I do like girls!" Ritsuka protested. "Not as much as my sister, but I do!"

"You mean you like your sister more than other girls?" Illya teased deviously.

"N-No! What I mean is I like girls, but in a healthy way, not as much as she does!"

"In addition to Astolfo-dono," Assassin nodded, with Mordred and Marie nodding sort of reluctantly about the fact.

"Yes!" Ritsuka agreed. "I mean, no! Assassin, why would you ever say that?!"

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

Astolfo, Rider of Black, Knight of Charlemagne, Voted Most Trappy Trap of Chaldea, sighed sadly to himself, barely opening his delicate, small and pink lips that definitely were very soft. "Uwaaaa... I really miss Master, I wonder what is he up to now...?"

Rubbing his legs together nervously, he reached under his bed after some hesitation, pulled out a black wig, and walked out of his room with it, heading towards Ritsuko's door. He knocked on it and was rewarded a moment later when she peeked out, staring intently at him. "Yeeeees...?"

Sheepishly, he held the wig up. "Please...?"

Ritsuko sighed, took the wig from him, put it on her head, and invited him in. "What the heck, I was working on something important, but I can understand why you'd feel that way. We aren't made of stone, right?"

"Yayyyy, thank you, Master...!" Astolfo said while merrily skipping in, Ritsuko closing the door behind him. "Hello Olga-san! Is that a new gag? And your ropes have been changed, I see!"

* * *

"In any case, it's not like I have any actual interest in taking his role or anything, beyond my simple desire to be useful to the Master I am indebted to," Assassin added, stoically looking into the horizon way the opposite way. Had the wind not been frozen too, it would have blown some convenient sakura petals his way. Marie, a woman of compassion and sense of dramatic timing, quickly made it to the nearest sakura tree, plucked several flowers from it, and tossed them in Assassin's general direction before enough time had passed for the effect to be lost.

Mordred blinked, perplexed. "Aren't those out of season? A-Anyway, Master, forget about that little no-good, Knight Of the Round Table-copy paladin fink Astolfo already! He's far less of a man than I, the first and foremost of your Servants! I'm willing to make an exception for Rider, but you shouldn't entertain yourself with lesser Servants from now on!"

Artoria nodded. "Verily. Be always mindful of your domestic life, Mordred. Infidelity most often shall lead to great disgrace, in more than one sense."

"Oh, NOW you're going to give parental advice about that," Chisame said.

Artoria glared quietly at her. "You still complain even after I do as you wanted? Is there no way to ever please you?"

"Yes, well, you should know!" Mordred hissed like an upset cat at her father. "So, what do you say, Rider? Now, before my patience and tolerance run out! We have little time to waste with this problem, even if technically we have all time ever!"

Rider nodded. "Very well. It's not the most perfect arrangement for a wife, but then, Master would surely be just as understanding if Louis returned to reclaim his place as my other husband!"

Ritsuka slapped a hand on his face. "Not you too, Marie! For the last time, being a Master doesn't equal being a husband!"

"Bet you wouldn't be treating that Astolfo guy that way," Chamo piped in.

Ritsuka just huffed and squeezed him under a foot, proving he was Ritsuko's brother after all.

"Animal abuse!" Chamo wailed while Negi retrieved him and pulled him up to his chest, giving Ritsuka a dirty look.

Ritsuka muttered, "Why doesn't your 'brother' just kiss Pluto-san and be done with it instead? I have to kiss several people, but he can't kiss a single one?"

"You do realize you're asking that from a child, while you are already a man, aren't you, Master?" Assassin asked. "It would be unfair to the lady to ask her to settle for such an inexperienced novice."

"Besides," Asuna said, "the brat here has been kissed by like fifteen girls already, I think he needs a break before he gets turned into some kind of maniacal sex offender."

"A-Asuna-san!" Negi gasped, blushing. "I'd never-!"

"F-F-Fifteen?!" Ritsuka was just as startled. "So many?! I didn't know that! What are you, ten?! Ah... All right, fine, you win, I'll do it!" He threw his hands up. "I'm a goner already either way, so what's the difference...? However, if I end up becoming more like my sister, you'll only have yourselves to blame."

Assassin had the good grace to look like he was having second thoughts. "Put that way, perhaps it would be safer if we found some other way?"

"Tres bien...!" Rider cheered, giving several thrilled small claps in a row, giggling excitedly.

"You sound very excited over the prospect of being kissed by a guy who did his best to not have to, even implying he'd rather do it with a man (not that there's anything wrong with that). I mean, the part of him liking guys, not the part of playing with your heart like that," Chisame said.

"Well," Mordred shrugged, "she's the kind to bounce back from being jailed, deposed, humiliated and beheaded with an all-loving view on the entirety of mankind, so she's that sort of girl. That's just her nature..."

"Marie-dono has her executioner as one of her closest confidantes, such is the extension of her all-forgiving heart," Assassin nodded. "Why wouldn't she forgive Master liking Astolfo-dono better than her?"

"I DON'T!" Ritsuka roared, waving his fists around, his eyes red as traffic lights. "I-it's not like I think Astolfo's cute and hot or anything! It's merely out of… of … SHUT UP!"

"Well, I was wrong, Sempai, he's not as bland as you after all, who'd have thought, huh?" Chisame blandly confided to Shirou.

The redhead snorted. "Cute, Hasegawa-san, very cute...!"

* * *

Life is all about taking advantage of the chances given to you or paying for failing to do so. Then again, of course, there are those for whom no chances are even given at all; for those, life is all about accepting your place as fodder for others' happiness at best, and wait patiently until your death, enduring the suffering in the meanwhile. For more information, visit your local church.

At least, such was the thinking of a man born long ago, in a far away land, who was once randomly chosen by his people as the embodiment of all of the world's evils, and quickly ritually sacrificed because of it afterwards. The villagers had thought they'd actually purged the world of evil through said ritual, but of course, it could never be that easy. The deed was actually evil in itself, so all it did was give Evil a new sentient vessel.

The man, who had long ago forgotten his own name, if he'd ever had one to start with (ancient tribal cultures could be like that), had come to readily accept his designation as Angra Mainyu over time. He normally slept within the Grail of Fuyuki ever since being first summoned to Earth decades ago, content with his lot in life, miserable as it was. The remaining human part of it was often bothered by his corruption, spurred on to achieve greater things in the destruction of mankind, but the human half's vices included laziness, and Angra Mainyu overall did a crappy job of being that evil. He supposed he had already done enough for quite a while during the Fourth War, burning a whole city to the ground, destroying a happy family, and giving a Servant deranged by his own power a body to go destroy the world for him if he wished so. Did he really have to get to work only ten years after that?

Sadly or not, apparently the answer was 'yes', and after a long stretch of the Fifth Grail War where Angra Mainyu took things in stride and let them happen at their own rhythm, that annoying inhuman part of him manifested him as a Servant and basically told him to stop screwing around and go enforce its evil will. What a bother! It wasn't that he cared about mankind, not after what those bastards did to him, but he didn't think they were really worth his effort either. At first he'd just thought of giving knives to everyone and making them kill each other, that was easy enough and required little work, but then these guys from beyond had arrived and contacted him, telling him they were Grail specialists of sorts, going from world to world to gather Grails and ultimately usher in the annihilation of all of human history.

Well, the Avenger thought that should be good enough for his other half, and so he carelessly shrugged and said "Sure, why not?" Life was all about taking the given chances, after all. Anything to get it over with fast.

The foreigners (Angra Mainyu was a foreigner to this land himself, but these were foreigners to this whole world) had gathered several other allies since their discreet arrival, some of them being some fabulous looking guys from eras even before Angra's own. Angra was, in fact, a bit jealous they looked even better than him, those old bastards, with their perfect hair and flawless, handsome faces. No wonder they had so many nice looking chicks around them, even if two of them were obviously gay for each other. What a waste. When Angra tried to approach some of those guys' groupies, they had reacted with disgust and pushed him away, bringing him clear memories of his first life. Why are unpleasant memories always the clearest ones?

Angra had thought about raping them, because after all he was supposed to be like evil and there was like nothing more evil than rape (except possibly writing teen vampire 'romance' novels), but that too was such a bother, and he guessed the fabulous guys from the long forgotten empire wouldn't have liked it, and that would've led to a fight, and Angra was lazy about fights too, and frankly, kind of a weakass on his own as well. Rather than having his butt kicked by a metrosexual who had to be into little girls and two gay guys (not that there was anything wrong with that), Angra played along with them and accepted their assignment to take advantage of this new unexpected chance.

Apparently there was this Negi kid nosing around the latest Grail War with his own team of powerful allies, and the guys Avenger was working with and they wanted them out of the way. That was reasonable enough, Avenger guessed, but on the other hand, the guys didn't wish for a direct confrontation yet, claiming it'd show their hand too soon.

Avenger sighed as he pushed his way through the lines of visitors standing before the Haunted House, even though he at least enjoyed this part of the job. Skipping lines was the kind of low effort evil he could get behind of. As he stopped before the two small nun-clad girlies sitting behind the front desk, he went over to the bothersome part of the job and pulled the bag of seeds out of his pocket.

These guys, the ones with the demon groupies, they were big on mind control, apparently. From what Avenger gathered, not that he really gave a flipping shit either way, they used to run rackets of mass mind control to gather energy from foolish humans over at the CLAMP District until that stopped working because the only ones left had no minds to control or something, and Avenger guessed that was actually kind of cool. Screwing the masses over was supposed to be his thing, and he saw the appeal of it, but then again, such a bother… maybe he should've just called these guys earlier, so they could settle the whole Grail War mess for him? It looked like his goals were compatible with theirs, he only wished he'd been calling the shots instead of being the errand boy. No respect, not even here and now.

"I mean," he said, as he forced Kasuga Misora's mouth open and pushed the first seed of darkness from the Dark Kingdom (100% GMO, non-organic, bad for the environment!) within, "I'm the Root of All of the World's Evils, dammit! You'd think I'd be running the show here! I'll have to do something about those guys later on, yeah, sure…"

After feeding Misora and Cocone their respective seeds, he mechanically patted their heads and walked inside, almost dragging his feet in. "Well, enjoy yourselves then, as soon as you meet that kid again," the heavily tattooed figure almost yawned, wandering into the all-consuming darkness inside. "Who knows, he might even enjoy it too. Wouldn't that be a kick in the pants, heh heh…"

Avenger had an overall good time inside, although he nearly wet his pants through the Gotham City displays. He'd definitely have to steer clear from that place in the future. He was evil, but those freaks were just downright bugfuck crazy!

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **OMAKE SECTION! HO!**

* * *

 **Taiga Dojo!**

"..." Taiga-sensei said, standing perfectly still at the middle of the Dojo, facing the camera with a fixed, completely motionless expression and never-blinking, eerily absent eyes. It was as if she was an unmoving screenshot that couldn't be assed to have intermediary animations between poses!

Standing by her side in her Physical Education uniform, Illyasviel sighed and waved to the audience. "Try again next chapter, please. We're having technical difficulties right now..."

* * *

 **Sailor V Says!**

"..." Sailors Venus, Mercury and Mars said, all standing perfectly still at the middle of the street, facing the camera with fixed, completely motionless expressions and never blinking, eerily absent eyes. It was as if they were an unmoving screenshot that couldn't be assed to have intermediary animations despite how cheaply it could be done these days before all the budget had been blown on the CGI transformation sequence!

Standing by their side softly tapping on the pavement with her Time Key, Sailor Pluto sighed and shook her head. "Well, what did you expect? They're still out of commission, try again next time! Huh? Well, I suppose I could tell you today's moral myself, but... what would be the point, seriously? Aren't you all old enough not to need cheesy morals at the end of an episode by now? Are you seriously telling me you're still following this continuity without being old enough as to read H and to have watched around one hundred different anime? What, do you just enjoy having beautiful women telling you what to do with your lives? Is that your fetish, people?"

She exhaled, pulled out a cigarette, and began puffing on it. "They never asked me to put up with this kind of crap while I was doing EVA, seriously!"

* * *

 **Some Days You Just Can't Win...**

 _Make a contract with me and become a Magical Girl?_ Kyubey asked Koizumi Mahiru from Honnouji Academy.

"..." the other school's local red-haired, perky young reporter said, standing perfectly still at the middle of the street, facing nothing in particular with a fixed, completely motionless expression and never blinking, eerily absent eyes.

Kyubey sighed, lowering his head. Girls were, for some reason, so uncooperative everywhere today, no matter where he went. Good thing he couldn't actually feel any frustration...

* * *

 **You Take the Bad, You Take the Good...**

"- and I can't stand the way you ignore me when I'm so obviously suffering over your indifference, either!" Asahina Mikuru kept on wailing and ranting, now actually grabbing the mannequin-still Suzumiya Haruhi by the shoulders and shaking her violently. "You're so smart, you have to realize the way I feel about it! You just choose to be a bitch about it! Oh God, I hate you so much, sometimes, I swear I could kill you, and to hell with any Directives, if only I didn't love you so much...!"

Sitting nearby and flipping through a book, Nagato Yuki shook her head at the pitiful show while waiting for new instructions. So far, all her superiors and Asahina's had issued on the subject was a standby order until the situation was properly assested and defined. Apparently they were coordinating it with some parallel universe's Data Overmind from what Asakura had been able to hack from home, then to told her through the secret line. And of course, Asahina had taken that chance to at last unload some of the things she had wanted to tell Haruhi on her face...

Oh Great Designer of the Overmind, Asahina was actually kissing Suzumiya now, as if there was no tomorrow! Even though that possibility was actually rather likely, Nagato still had to heavily disapprove, not only of Asahina's impulsiveness and blatant disregard of the Dude She's Like in a Coma Clause, but also of her terrible taste in women. Seriously.

Yuki returned to her book, comfortably sitting where she was on the lap of a Kyon who was just as frozen on his seat of the Brigade's recruitment stand as Suzumiya and Koizumi (no relation to the red-haired, perky young reporter from Honnouji... we think) were on theirs.

What? If Asahina could take advantage of her situation, why couldn't she as well? A pity he didn't have a hard-on.


	6. Cant' TimeStop the Music

_Back then:_

"Y-You...!" the corrupted Saber, who for once wasn't a version of Artoria, gasped in shock. "You are... But it can't be! You, here?!"

Ritsuka blinked. "What do you mean?"

"My, my!" Rider took a fragant hand to her fair cheek. "Do you know my real name then? Would you be someone I know, my brave knight?"

Jeanne Alter stared angrily at D'Eon. "Saber. Who is she?"

The Saber bit on their lower lip, unable to answer.

"Don't ignore me!" Jeanne Alter commanded.

Reluctant but clearly audible, Saber spoke again. "I can tell for sure, since this presence is unmistakable. The flower that stands amidst the chaos. The beauty that was marked in my eyes forever. The girl who was praised as the Rose of Versailles! She is... Marie Antoinette!"

"... I hate to say this," Ritsuko quietly said then, "but if that's who she is, then she really didn't stand amidst the chaos, she was-"

"Ahhhh!" Rider told Saber. "So you did know me after all! I'm glad for being called by that name again! Yes, that is who I am. So now you know, Mademoiselle Dragon-Witch-who-is-causing-trouble-in-my-beloved-country. It's probably pointless to ask you even now, but after you have realized my role as this kingdom's ruler, you must answer to me for the offenses brought upon it!"

Jeanne Alter's right eyebrow twitched in a worrying stacatto. "Are you actually trying to impose yourself upon me?"

"Yeah, that's probably kind of a bad idea at the time, Your Majesty," Ritsuko nodded.

Marie Antoinette huffed, puffing her small chest up defiantly at the much taller attacker. "Why, yes, I am! It is both my duty and right through royalty, after all! Are you so evil you would continue this violence even before me?"

"Yes, yes I am," Alter nodded without a shadow of doubt.

"... oh," Rider said, then looked back at Ritsuka. "Monsieur, Mademoiselle Shielder, what do you have to say about this?"

"It's not a matter of what to say or not, this long ago crossed the point of being solved through words!" Ritsuka protested, on the verge of outright panic.

"Quite so!" Alter agreed, fiercely stomping ahead. "A queen who was favored like a spoiled kitten, and then accepted her death without a struggle, would never understand the depth of my spite, my desire to make the world burn! My edge, my edge! My dark and gritty edge!" she madly gestured with a hand as Ritsuko and Saber shared a quiet, silent rolling of their eyes, despite standing in opposite sides.

"So I see," Marie nodded steadily. "Well, I cannot have respect for someone like that. I cannot forgive you, Dragon Witch!" she pointed at Jeanne. "You are only venting your anger out with no rhyme or reason! That is the worst motive to lash out against the people, just because you were wronged, Saint of Orleans! Even my murderers had ulterior motives, ideals beyond simply making the world pay! But as your Queen, I will not stand for you where I stood for them! I will make you call me Queen! I will claim that hard-to-understand heart, and that whole body of yours!"

Jeanne made a face of utter disgust, as her sickly pale cheeks grew red. "... what?"

"Um," Mashu swallowed, "I think that, that might've been phrased better..."

"I stand for what I said, a true Queen never goes back on her word!" Marie said, folding her arms. "I'm going to make her kneel before me and kiss my feet!"

"... cool?" Ritsuko said in a very small voice, absently rubbing her legs together.

Jeanne hissed in growing fury, then exploded again in another insane tantrum. "No, I won't, of course I won't! I'm not that kind of stupid girl! Servants!" she shouted. "Deal with that annoying princess first. Rank and file, get your asses moving and deal with that bunch!"

 _Right now:_

"So basically, that's the kind of person Marie-dono is, going from the Doctor's quite detailed narrations on the subject," Assassin finished narrating, just as a grumbling Chamo drew the circle around the feet of an excited Marie and a downtrodded, miserable looking, Ritsuka.

"Please tell me you killed that poor Dragon Witch woman afterwards and don't have her suffering constant stupidly oblivious teasing from that airhead," Chisame mumbled at him, low enough Rider wouldn't overhear her. Since she really didn't want to hurt that airhead's feelings, for some reason or another. Argh, why did that random person who just happened to be a long dead queen of France make her feel that way? Those Servants were all trouble, messing with poor normal people's heads like that!

"Well, actually... Hasegawa-dono, wasn't it...?" Assassin doubted, "I'd say Marie-dono is far from being Alter-dono's main concern at the time."

 _Chaldea:_

"Sister...!" Jeanne D'Arc, the blessed Ruler, cheerfully called out while knocking on the door. "The blizzards have calmed down outside!"

"I'M NOT YOUR SISTER!" her Alter's voice roared from the inside.

Ruler began singing angelically, very happy. _"Do you want to build a snowman? Come on, let's go and play. I never see you anymore. Come out the door. It's like you've gone away...!"_

Jeanne Alter buried her head under her pillows, clutching on them desperately, and yelled in despair. "WHY DIDN'T YOU KILL ME, FUJIMARU RITSUKA?! COME BACK SAFE AND SOUND ALREADY SO I CAN KILL YOU MYSELF!"

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Six**.

 **Can't (Time)Stop the Music**.

* * *

Based on creations of Akamatsu, Type-Moon and others.

Used without authorization, making no economic profit.

With editing, proofreading, and added goofing around by Shadow Crystal Mage.

* * *

"Close your eyes," she said, in a low, slightly playful, gentle voice that was impossible to resist, "and let me handle it. I have experience."

Ritsuka obeyed, since the voice was that compelling, while Mordred fumed a little at the French hussy flaunting her non-ignorance, before remembering she was Austrian by birth, so at least it wasn't a deadly insult. It was not one of those voices who were overwhelming on their sexuality like Medb's, he could turn those off with enough effort. Instead, it was simply so reasonable and agreeable you just couldn't think of any motivation to disobey. So he had nodded, then closed his eyes without even realizing it.

 _"Good Master,"_ Marie whispered, before touching the sides of his face with her fingertips and delicately pulling his face towards hers.

All eyes were on them as this happened, all but Berserker's, the brute oblivious to anything but his Master. When not sicced on anything or anyone to destroy, he defaulted to watching over her, and that was what he was doing now, even as the light exploded before them, Illya clapping at the beautiful magical show of colorful illumination. Normally, that would be more than enough to keep the albino well protected against anything short of a god, and possibly even that.

And yet, even for the son of Zeus, Prince of Power, etc, etc., there was little defense when someone literally appeared right under Illyasviel from nowhere, and quickly snatched her up in his arms as he zoomed upwards, flanked by two tall, darkly attractive females in tight short dresses. Berserker's first natural impulse to lunge forward at this unexpected newcomer and crush his skull was promptly halted by what remained of his sharp training as a guardian; as soon as he had leapt towards him, he pulled back, seeing the strange man holding the kicking Illya against himself, clasping a hand around her mouth.

Marie and Ritsuka pulled away from each other just as the card appeared between them, both turning their widened eyes towards the new surprise event. At the same time, a dagger flew from Sayoko's hand before anyone else could realize it, but it was easily caught in mid-air by one of the cruelly smirking women with the long haired man, who burned it to a crisp between her long, claw-like fingers.

"That was uncalled for," Sayoko said stoically.

"You!" Chamo gasped, being the only one of them but Sailor Pluto who recognized the man as soon as he showed himself. The Senshi of Time simply cursed to herself, standing her ground with her Time Key at the ready. By her side, Negi was doing the same with his staff; while he didn't know the man himself, he was familiar with the gray uniform he was wearing, and he remembered Chamo's story about his misadventures at CLAMP Gakuen one week ago. "The pedophile!" the ermine finished his gasp, further worrying Shirou, whose eyebrows were twitching wildly now, even as Artoria pushed him behind herself, taking advantage of his shock.

"I'm not a pedophile!" the tall and handsome man with the wavy, silky dark brown hair growled, further hugging the petite girl clad in nothing but a bikini against himself. "I am Nephrite, Second General of the Dark Kingdom! The harbinger of your collective doom, nay, your executioner! Fools, you made your last mistake when you left yourselves open to me!"

Mordred, already aiming Clarent at him, rolled her eyes before asking her father, "And this wanker would be...?"

"The Professor has told me about one as him," Artoria said, moving around as to keep blocking Shirou from moving ahead of her, Invisible Air as ready as it could be at the time. The Excalibur blast had greatly drained her, and she could tell the same could be said about Mordred, but she still trusted their superior numbers, and Berserker's presence, would make the difference. What bothered her was how easily that man had appeared between them without making his presence felt before his surprise move. Did he, too, move between worlds? "His allies disposed of that one, so this should be no more of a problem."

"Actually, Sailor Mars was the one to kill him," Chisame said as she also tried to keep Tsunetsuki back with her scepter, since she didn't want the airhead to think of her as a murderer either (arrrghhh, but why not?! Stupid sexy Servant! It had been bad enough with stupid Temptress messing with her, at least there'd been an excuse there!) "But yeah, well, that fruitcake wasn't that tough after all..."

Nephrite smiled arrogantly, ignoring even Berserker's beast-like, mad howls of fury aimed at him. His two minions were keeping less of a cold facade, but to their credit they stood by his sides without trembling excessively. "Watch your mouth when talking about even the weakest of us, little girl! You'll find out you can't underestimate the Dark Kingdom twice!"

"Yadda yadda, cut the bull, pal, the Senshi kicked your buddy's gay ass like twice a week even when there were only two of them!" Chamo shouted at him, angrily flipping him the bird. "I don't know why you thought it'd be a good idea coming here to mess with us, but no way you're a match against the whole lot of us, so better drop the kid or else, you pedophile!"

Illya rather rudely shouted a few muffled objections against being called a 'kid' through Nephrite's fingers.

"I am not a pedophile!" Nephrite cried.

"You're the one who just randomly abducted a little girl and are holding her against your body," Satomi pointed out.

"Illya-chan, is he using his other hand to touch you in a bad place?" Shirou asked urgently, wondering if using a command seal to nuke this pervert would be all right, and if Tohsaka would yell at him for it later.

"I'm not a pedophile, damn it!" Nephrite yelled. "It's just purely random coincidence my victims happen to middle and elementary schoolers!"

"You victimize little kids like that?" Ritsuko cried, aghast. "Even my sister only does it to Servants who only _look_ like little kids! Saber, Assassin, Rider, make sure to get this pedophile, okay?"

"Damn it, stop misconstruing what I'm saying!" Nephrite protested. "I don't grope them, I simply reach inside their bodies and steal immaterial life energies from within!"

"I-Inside their bodies?!" Rider gasped. "You take their virginities? I'm afraid I must agree, Monsieur, you definitely sound like a pedophile!"

"To blatantly announce yourself as such before honorable warriors, you have surely come here to search for death," Assassin quietly said, genuinely curious about this man. He had no personal stakes in this conflict and was callous enough as to call the accidental demise of a child in a battlefield mere unfortunate collateral damage seen in any war, but he knew of the Master's moral beliefs, and he would always humor them whenever possible. Also, pedophile. At least make it a boy, like a warriors should! "If so, please duel with me one on one. I will gladly grant your wish without the need for hostages, pedophile-san."

Nephrite gave a strangled growl, despite finding himself liking this fellow from beyond. He might have made a good addition to the ranks of the Generals, he even had the proper looks and the type of voice. "How polite of you to offer, but no! I expect to live far beyond the whole lot of you!"

"Death flag, buster!" Chamo huffed. "You will only have yourself to blame!"

"He's not going to live long anyway," Matoi said. "Everyone knows pedophiles get killed off quickly."

Nephrite's expression grew serious again. "I"m not a pedophile, you imbeciles! And I won't need to stain my hands with your blood! Instead, the brute will do it... if he wants for his Master's release!" Then he glared as several people opened their mouths. "Shut up! I know what that sounded like, but I'm not a pedophile, damn it! Look, my hands are out where you can see them and not touching anywhere inappropriate!"

It was then that Negi recalled, much to his rising terror, that Illya had after all come to Japan in the first place to kill Shirou, and probably him as well, and that Heracles was her rather efficient tool to do it, one that had almost killed them all before...

He looked into his sister's eyes, desperately trying to look for a signal of her full regret from those ways. She'd been fairly mellow towards them during the last few days, so that had to be a clear sign she had changed her mind and was now being merely passive aggressive like the Master, right? Yes, that was the way it always worked surely, when forced to choose between their life and death for real, she wouldn't treat this as a sick game anymore, and instead...

Then he realized, to his ultimate panic, she wasn't looking at his eyes, but rather into Berserker's. To the man-brute's hostile, gruff unspoken question, she answered with nothing but a casual shrug of her shoulders and a subtle motion of a bare foot, aimed towards Negi and his allies.

"Oh, you little bitch!" Chisame cried.

Then Berserker abruptly turned back, gave a roar bigger than life itself, and madly charged in their general direction.

* * *

The first time Negi met Berserker and Illya sicced the behemoth at him and his friends, all they could really do was barely dodge the incredibly fast mammoth for a short while, not harming him at all, until Nodoka took Illya down, thus stopping Berserker through his only real Achilles' heel (though Illya would have said Achilles was just a weak jobber who has such an obvious weakness compared to her all-invincible Berserker).

This time, Negi had less allies around him, and Nodoka obviously wouldn't be coming to help at any moment.

In moments like these the normally optimistic Negi could really understand Chisame's frustration with the threats and dangers coming from the magical corners of the world.

Berserker screamed a long chain of horrible noises that only could be remotely depicted as a strand of black squares stretching across these lines while waving his slab of rock in all directions, swatting directly at Assassin and brutally slamming him aside. Negi was shocked the smaller Servant had even survived that, although he only remained down for the moment, barely moving on his hands and knees. Negi himself couldn't worry about that any longer as he had to leap over Berserker's foot the very next moment. He thought of zapping him with a spell now that he was close, but Berserker moved so fast Negi was afraid he'd simply move out of the way and he'd end up hitting someone else. Which was a very accurate assessment of their current situation.

Now he understood, too, why his father and alternate-version future self seemed to have favored physical attacks over traditional spell-blasting that frequently. He swore inwardly, if he survived this, that he'd start spending more time learning under Ku Fei, and probably Kaede, maybe even Kotaro... okay, probably not Kotaro, he had standards after all.

The Sabers struck at Berserker's wide, muscular back from behind, both swords only cutting shallowly into his thick flesh. They were both spent, Arturia more so since Shirou was still an absolutely crap magus, and Berserker's body was a gigantic mass that might as well have been made of the hardest stone. Spinning around without caring about the now-healing paper cuts on him, he slapped both blondes back with another murderous roar, sending them flying several feet away.

"Oh my God, it's happening again," Ritsuka muttered as Rider kept him back. "Just like in Okeanos, but this time there's no Ark around...!"

"SABER!" Shirou screamed, looking around for anything to use and Reinforce, but Satomi stopped him with a massive gauntlet on his hand.

"Sempai, don't!" the genius girl chided. "Come on, I'll take you and Sensei out of here, now!"

"Don't bother, you'll never get away. Why don't you surrender and spare yourselves the worst?" Nephrite taunted from where he stood with Illya, on top of a nearby ledge, only two stories up. In all honesty, and despite religiously following the Dark Kingdom's policies on cruelly mocking outmatched heroes, he didn't get the same pleasure from this part of the job that Zoicite got (then again, who could? Zoicite was a fucking psycho). Even the thought of avenging Jadeite was already getting sort of calmed, and further harassing these stupid children was looking just pointless already. Sure, he was pissed aboutt he accusations of being a pedophile, but just watching them getting their little asses kicked wasn't doing anything to make them feel even. So he gestured with his free arms towards the youngsters. "Leave the Servants for the monster, but take the riffraff out already. Right now!" he commanded.

With matching nods, the women jumped down, arms and claws outstretched, one aiming for Chisame and Matoi, the other for Satomi and Shirou. Asuna, who had been trying to lure Berserker away from the others, gasped and tried to run towards the closest demonic female, that lunging for Satomi, but before she had covered half of the way, a mostly purple blur zoomed past her, and suddenly the evil woman appeared to grind to a halt in mid-air. With ghastly wide eyes, she opened her mouth trying to make a sound that never came, instead vomiting a sizeable black splotch before exploding into shining shreds in all directions.

"A-Assassin-san?!" Asuna stopped as well, seeing the ponytailed Servant back on his feet, huffing and breathing between her and Satomi and Shirou, sword elegantly deployed before them.

"How... How are these... _things_ called?" he asked.

"Youma!" Negi helpfully supplied while Berserker also batted him aside with nothing bit a grazing touch of his knee. "Thanks by the way!" he sincerely said before slamming against a tree, very happy Satomi had been saved while he couldn't help.

Assassin nodded sparsely, still wobbling slightly on his feet, Berserker's direct hit still well felt. "Youma are just bigger swallows, then."

In the meanwhile, Matoi had ripped yet another utility pole out of the ground and was swinging it with willd and disproportionately super-strong abandon, screaming for the youma to stay the heel away from her Chisame-sama, actually managing to impress Nephrite from his observation spot. Chisame, behind her manted to tag the youma's knee with her sceptre's balsts, causing it to stumble briefly. Matoi used the distraction to directly slam down her pole on top of the youma's head, crushing it brutally. With a messy crack, the youma exploded into tiny pieces that then became dust, spraying all over the street.

Nephrite huffed, seeing Sailor Pluto come to Negi's aid, leaping between him and the advancing Berserker and keeping the latter back as best as she could with a point blank Dead Scream. While that hardly hurt Heracles at all, the whole thing was taking far longer than Nephrite had expected for, and those cursed Senshi always found a way to inconvenience them more than they should. He decided to pull back and leave the fools for Berserker to deal with; even in the worst case, he would have a valuable gift for his Queen, as this homunculus he held seemed to harbor incredible amounts of energy...

Then, as he was starting to disappear, he was struck from behind, forcing him to scream and drop his hostage. Quickly taking a hand to his aching ribcage, he found his fingers stained all over with his dark, corrupted blood, while the sleek blur of motion that had passed by him stopped short, now holding the confused Illya in an arm while the other held a long crimson spear. Oh shit, not another meddling Servant. How many of those idiots existed anyway? Maybe they were even worse than the Senshi!

This new Servant had something that made him different from the others, though, something that made everyone fighting below, even Berserker himself, pause and look up at him, incredulously.

"It's... It's you!" Artoria recognized the newcomer despite of the striking alteration to his appearance. "But, why are you...?"

"Lancer, you idiot!" Mordred spat out in a far ruder tone. "Why are you wearing a damn bag on your empty head?!"

The man with the paper bag on his head sighed miserably, sadness evident through the small holes opened for his eyes' benefit. "Not now, please, Saber. This is not the best moment at all to explain the bloodily obvious..."

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"Madam, you had better have," Sir Gawain said, as he, the Saber version of Gilles de Rais, D'Eon, the expressionless Artoria Alter and the extremely nervous Artoria Lily all kept their swords aimed at her from every flank, "a very good and convincing explanation for this intrusion."

The tanned bombshell in the tiger bikini flinched with a small drop of sweat attached to a side of her head. "Well, I've gotta say this is the first place where I've been greeted this way while dressed THIS way. What's the problem guys, thinking I'm hiding a weapon anywhere wearing this? Give me a break…"

"Those could be false," Alter icily said, staring at the size of the just-detected invader's breasts, "and you might be hiding something down below…"

"Hey, I'm all-natural!" the woman growled. "What, you bothered whenever someone's bustier than you? Then go grab the right lance and leave me alone! No, seriously, fellas, who's in charge here? I need to—"

"That'd be me, I think, sorry, sorry!" Doctor Roman said as he clumsily all but stumbled into the surveillance room where the mostly naked woman had appeared only moments ago, floating out of a screen after putting on a teasing show for the techie sitting at that post. Said bridge bunny was now innocently crossing his legs together while sitting aside, not daring to look Leonardo and Roman in the face as they barged in. "How do you do! I'm Doctor Romani Akkiman, and you would be…?"

"Doctor, that's not the established protocols dealing with invaders," Leonardo patiently chided while marching behind him. Then she looked up and down at the form of the female standing before them. "Well. The strip search won't take long, at the very least. Please state your Class and True Name, Miss…?"

"I'm not a Servant, sister, I'm a goddess," the woman said, gesturing at them to slow down with a hand. "Yeah, you heard me right, a real divine spirit. No 'divinity traits', no demigod, no, the real McCoy, that's why you never saw me coming in. So you'd better start showing some respect, ya here!"

"If you wished for respect, you should have arrived otherwise dressed," Artoria Alter pointed out.

The alleged goddess gave her an upset glare. "I bet you're the soul of the party 'round here, aren't you, Hon? Funny, you should have some more color in your skin than that. And you," she told Lily next, "you're too young, what's the matter with you? Seriously, you kinda look like my little sister with a wig on…"

"Okay, okay, the Master's here now, all is right with the world, leave everything to me!" Ritsuko interrupted, pushing her way into the room while buttoning the top of her collar with a blissfully smiling Astolfo walking behind her, legs oddly spread and twitching at each step. "What's up now, do we have any news on Bro and—Ooohhhh, nice!" she screeched to a halt, her eyes growing wide as soon as she saw the swimwear-clad beauty.

Urd flinched instinctively. "That," D'Eon sighed, "is the real reason why you shouldn't have come dressed that way, Madame."

"Nonsense, a person like THAT dressed like THAT can knock on my door anytime they want!" Ritsuko quickly zoomed past Roman and Leonardo, staring up at the exuberant female with gigantic starry eyes. "Oh, but you must be cold after going through the mountains in that skimpy bikini! Why don't you come over to My Room, I've got some excellent heaters there and—"

"Rit-chan, please!" Roman coughed into a fist as Leonardo made a hasty phone call on the side, occasionally nodding at the excited questions from the other end of the line. "Treat the lady with respect, she's a goddess…"

"I can see that, yes!" the girl nearly skipped in place with giddy glee.

"I mean it, Rit-chan!" Roman protested. "Take this seriously, will you? I bet your brother would—"

"Ohhhh, yes, it's youuuuu!" a giggling voice cut sharply through the air as someone else also broke in at top speed, trampling all over Roman and silencing him as his mouth hit the floor. Then the woman in the bikini barely fared any better as she was violently tackled and nearly suffocated, her face roughly pressed between two massive breasts that made hers almost look small. The thusly Marshmallow Hell-ed half demoness winced as that annoying voice she hadn't heard in such a long blessed while rang in her ears over and over. "Urd, Urd, URD! My best of bestest friends in the Norse pantheon, I'm sooooo glaaaaaad! Look at her, look, Darling, remember Urd?! Remember all I've told you about her, Darling?! My college roommate, Urd!"

"… hello, Artemis, it's been a while," Urd blandly said, wondering if that was how Rind felt about her after all. She struggled to pull free and finally managed to break away from the vacantly smiling dopey looking tall and busty fair skinned woman holding her in her vicious love grip. "Still the same, I see. Huh. A new pet?"

The small furry animal wearing some sort of tanned skin loincloth over his privates sighed miserably. "I'm Orion, Mighty Hunter, Hero of Yore, etc. Are you a goddess of death, come to answer my prayers…?"

"That was… hot," Ritsuko quietly said, primly drying the stream of blood from her nose as her gaze kept going slowly, back and forth, between Urd and Artemis. "So, um, then you're a goddess for real, that's even better! Oh, I know, you're a Deus Ex Machina that will solve this whole situation for us and kick the Grand Caster's ass in the name of Heaven, right? Who'd have thought it, Jeanne-chan's method worked! Praying pays after all!"

The drop of sweat on Urd's head returned now twice as big. "Um, of course you should pray to your divinity of choice regularly, but I'm afraid I'm not here to magically fix whatever you guys are up to here. Rules of the biz, you know, didn't Artemis ever tell—no, of course she wouldn't, anyway. I'm here to help, to some degree, but I'd also like to get some help in return…"

"Why," Saber Alter asked harshly, "would a goddess have need for our assistance? Other than Artemis, who obviously has special needs?"

"Wow, I had no idea they had euphemisms for retardation at your shit-covered doomed kingdom, that was nice from you," Artemis smiled happily. "Well, we all need help sometimes, silly!" she giggled. "Especially Urd, who is only half-goddess!"

Leonardo and Roman stared accusingly at Urd. "I thought you'd just told us you weren't a demigod?" the former asked.

"I'm not," Urd argued, "at least not in the sense I'm not half-mortal, and hence no mortal at all…"

"Urd is half-demon, too!" Artemis pointed out, making Urd grimace horribly at her once more. "Say, Urd, how are the girls doing? Peorth, Rind, Belldandy, Aqua?"

"Peorth still needs a man badly, Rind still needs anyone period badly, Belldandy was captured, tortured, and nailed to a cross to suffer for years while powering a dying world, and Aqua took Belldandy's office afterwards before she got sent to Mundus Magicus by a wish," Urd curtly summed up.

"Oh…" Artemis paused. "Well, at the very least, things worked out for Aqua! I always knew she'd make it far!"

"You were the only one who ever placed any hopes whatsoever on Aqua, Artemis!" Urd roared.

"And I was right, wasn't I?" Artemis nodded, vindicated, as her boobs lightly bounced up and down, a movement mirrored by Ritsuko's head. "Let me introduce you to everyone, this is Doc Roman, and that's Leo, she draws nifty portraits of us, and the lovely lady drooling after you is my beloved Master Ritsuko-chan, and that's Astolfo, and—"

Urd sighed loudly, then looked at Roman. "Look, the sooner I'm gone the better, so let's make this quick. I have just experienced a time crisis back at my jurisdiction, you might call it my realm, and while studying its causes I managed to track several presences coming from this dimension to mine. So I thought I'd come over to see if you knew something on what's going on…"

"And you thought it'd be a good idea coming in a bikini?" D'Eon incredulously asked.

"I was in a hurry, okay?!" Urd protested. "Not my fault if your mess caught me with my pants down. I was on vacation!"

Several people gasped.

"Don't you know those things are cursed!" Ritsuko said, looking aghast for once.

Urd sniffed derisively. "Only for mortals. The universe wouldn't curse a goddess's vacation like that."

"And yet here you are on your vacation," Roman pointed out.

"…" Urd said as realization hit her. "Damned nasty evil bitch of a universe! Dad really needs to give your bitchy ass a spanking! Anyway, what's this I'm hearing about a Grand Caster? What's so grand about Casters, they're supposed to be one of the first to ever fold like a cheap lawn chair in any War!"

"Heyyyy, now, please…" Leonardo's lower lip jutted up in offense.

"Yes, even I can kick my Caster-self's ass," Saber Gilles said.

"Ah hah ha ha, so true!" Artemis giggled again while Orion sighed very sadly. "Anyway, that's Barry over there still crossing his legs. You showed him one of your videos, didn't you? Don't worry, Barry, I'm sure it'll be gone in a hour or two! And finally, this is Saber Alter, not to be confused with Rider Alter, or Lancer Alter, or Jeanne Alter—"

The Saber Alter lowered her weapon at all, speaking somewhat more gently at Urd now. "Perhaps I was too hasty in judging you. Anyone who has suffered that much under the bimbo cannot be that bad."

"Amen to that, Sister," Orion exhaled.

"Oh, you're so bad, Darling!" Artemis knocked on his head with her knuckles before asking Urd, "So, what Class are you, Urd? Temptress, right? I was thinking the other day, it's about time we had a Temptress here, all these Classes ending up in '-er' get boring after a while. I'd change my Saint Graph myself to a Temptress but I'm not really the Temptress kind, but you are, and so much! It's like Aqua always said, you have always been a real sl—"

"I'M NOT ANY CLASS, KIND OR TYPE OF SERVANT, THANK YOU!" Urd shouted, slamming a bare foot down.

"Spirited too, I really like that!" Ritsuko gushed.

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"Ah!" Asuna snapped her fingers. "I know! It's the Amazing Bag-Man!"

There was a short but meaningful silence everywhere after that, to the point Asuna briefly worried they, too, had been frozen in time.

"... who?!" Nephrite finally snarled.

"Yes, Asuna-san, what do you mean?" Negi asked. "This might be helpful, so please..."

 ** _"Grwlf?!"_** even Berserker pitched in, although his attention remained squarely on the man holding his Master now. His primitive mindset was having problems deciding whether to follow his impulses and LEAP KILL SMASH already or staying back for Illya's safety. It didn't help that Illya, despite having her mouth free now, wasn't ordering him one way or the other; she was just peeking under the paper bag from her close position and blushing, toes twiddling around as her knees clasped together.

"Yeah, Bag-Man, an American superhero!" Asuna excitedly said. "I saw him on TV once, like two years ago! He was going to join the Fantastic Four, and the reporters were interviewing him at the Baxter Building, but I think that fell through! I never heard of him afterwards, but here he's now! Heyyy, Bag-Man-sama!" she waved up. "Nice to see you're okay, I was afraid Doctor Doom or the guy who shoots paste had killed you...!"

"What-what-what in the world are you ranting about?" Diarmuid demanded weakly, completely perplexed out of his mind. But Asuna wasn't insane, and there was no way she could know about the Human Torch playing a prank on Spider-Man after... Look, we actually took this from a real comic book that does exist, okay? Just Google it!

 ** _"BRRRW!"_** Heracles decided, making a vague mental note to DESTROY SMASH these noisy bugs later, but first retrieve his Master from the skinny girly-man with the toothpick. He jumped up towards the rooftop, making Nephrite flinch back and instantly disappear from sight, as the hulking savage swung his crude weapon towards the bag covering that head...

Only to have it blocked, against any expectations, by a surface just as wide if not wider than the club itself, that of a shiny black object vaguely shaped like a cross stuck on a massive shield, or possibly a huge table someone had begun carry as protection after removing the legs. That object was held, in a single hand, by a shapely young woman who had just leapt into the fray from above, enduring her best as the shockwaves of Berserker's punch rippled through the air. Ritsuka's face lit up with a wide smile at the sight of her. "Mashu!" he emotionally cried.

"Oh, right, the suck-up," Mordred grunted out a corner of her mouth. "Of course she couldn't stand to be away too long from the spotlight..."

Artoria's eyes had grown wide as saucers, fixed on the shield the new arrival was carrying. "Mordred! Is that...?"

"Yeah, you got it right," her son nodded, even as Berserker dropped to his feet on the rooftop, making the whole building tremble. The girl also landed on her feet before him, blocking his was to Diarmuid and Illya with the instrument of defense that was easily bigger than her. "That's indeed Lord Camelot, although it's still incomplete in this form. You should see it when she really tries..."

"But, but that's impossible!" the King gasped. "Lord Camelot could only be wielded by Galahad! None of us were silly enough to think carrying around a table was a good idea! Even Tristan thought it was going too far!"

"Long story," Mordred said with a smile, content to finally hold one over Artoria's head. "If I feel benevolent and you ask enough, perhaps I will tell you later."

Artoria already was talking to Ritsuka, who was nodding at her. "Oh, yeah, sure thing, Artoria-san, I'll explain everything as soon as we-"

"MASTERR!" Mordred growled. "This is exclusively between us Knights of the Round!"

Meanwhile, Negi had hopped on his staff and was flying towards the rooftop, ignoring Chisame's cries to stand back, while Berserker stomped towards Shielder, waving his arms madly over his head...

"Berserker, enough for now," Illya aloofly said as Lancer gently put her down. "Not like this. I can't savor the moment this way."

Her Servant paused, grumbled, then backed away from the smaller Servant obediently. Mashu breathed far easier; while she had never moved an inch while Berserker moved towards her, Negi could see clear signs of relief from fear now as he landed by her side. "Hey, are you fine, Miss...?" he softly asked her.

Mashu looked at this strange but apparently polite boy and nodded, smiling at him. "Yes, I am, thank you. You?"

"Only a few bruises, but I'll be okay, don't worry..." Negi tried to chuckle, putting a hand to his ribs, which felt like they were on fire. Then he looked sternly at Illya. "Seriously, Illya-chan, I thought we were past this by now? I'd expect better behavior from girls claiming to be my sisters!"

Illya pouted. "Nyahhh! What was I supposed to do anyway? My life was in danger! You all would place your own lives over your family's as well, if you were in the same situation!"

"Um, no, I know I wouldn't," Lancer said.

"Me neither," Negi frowned.

"Definitely not!" Mashu gasped, scandalized. The though she didn't actually have a family never crossed her mind since she thought of all of Chaldea as her family. Except maybe Caster Gilles because seriously, that guy!

"That's something only a psycho would say!" Asuna shouted from below, apparently already forgetting the part about not pissing off the kid with the leash on the immortal giant. Then again, her sense of fairness and loyalty was just that high.

Matoi blinked. "When we are talking about 'family', do I have to assume my flesh and blood relatives, or Chisame-sama and Negi-sama...? Because Mother would definitely understand if I leave her behind."

Illyasviel frowned, folded her arms, and looked aside. "This is the problem with hanging around with delusional people, seriously!"

* * *

"Well, all's well that ends well!" Ritsuka sighed like a corny 50's comicbook character as the whole lot of them finally stood at the same level, on the wrecked sidewalk, with Illya getting the only higher vantage point from where she now sat on Berserker's shoulder again.

"The hell it does!" Chisame said. "Nothing has 'ended', for starters! We're still stuck with everyone frozen in time, Negi's sister still wants to kill us, and even the pedo bad guy escaped! The only things that happened are that two random mooks died and you got two more of your Servants back!"

"Yes, about that," Artoria said, turning to Matoi. "Why have you not revealed your great strength before now?"

Matoi shrugged. "It comes and goes," she said, bending over tot he dropped utility pole. "See? Can't even budge it now."

"That… makes absolutely no sense whatsoever," Artoria said. "What, God just randomly decides to give you great strength sometimes and not at other times?"

"Eh, you get used to it," Chisame said tiredly.

Bag-Man looked curiously at Ritsuka. "Who is this young lady who disrespects you so, Master?"

Ritsuka sighed. "Don't hold it against her, Lancer. She's got a good point, actually, we haven't progressed that much, nice as it is to have you two back..."

"Oh, but we have made definite progress, Master!" Rider smiled, holding up her shiny new Card. It featured her image, standing proudly under the huge mass of her impossibly nifty hat, with _RIDER- Marie Antoinette Habusuburgo- Crystal Domum Regina_ written under it. "See, this is the undeniable proof of it!"

As Ritsuka winced and prepared himself, Mashu blinked in interest. "Oh? What's that, Marie-san? It's so cute...!"

Mordred smirked, pulling her own Card out as well. "Impressed, Shielder? Then take a look at this, it's even better! And I got mine first, too!"

"Oh, wow, that's wonderful as well!" Mashu gushed, while Ritsuka discreetly tried to sneak behind Shirou, who took pity on him and let him. "Wait, don't tell me! They have a printing machine around here that customizes those cards for you, don't they? I've read about those on the internet and school life manga! Sempai, please take me there, I want one too! I'll pay for it myself!"

"Oboy, this is gonna hurt," Chisame commented. "She's the First Girl, after all."

Asuna blinked. "First Girl?"

"Yeah, weren't you paying attention?" Chisame muttered to Asuna, low enough Mashu wouldn't overhear. "She's the first girl that lunkhead met while getting himself into this whole mess. So she's the First Girl, the one doomed to end up with the milksop, and the one who feels the most entitled to him. That means this is going to sting her really hard."

"Oh," Asuna nodded. "Yeah, you're right. That's the way it always is in... Wait, no, that can't work in real life! _I'm_ the First Girl this milksop met while getting himself in this mess!" she cried, pointing at Negi.

Negi, paying attention to the sudden spike in Asuna's voice, looked at her. "Asuna-san, what's wrong?"

"I'm the First Girl you met at Mahora, that's what's wrong!" Asuna furiously yelled at him.

He blinked, stunned at why that would be such a bad thing. "... uh? I don't get it, but anyway, no, you're wrong, Asuna-san! I ran into you and Konoka-san before getting to meet the rest of the class, true, but before that, I got to know two other Mahora students in the train taking me here!"

Asuna paused. "Huh, seriously? Who were those?"

"Well, if you need to know, it was Momioka Risa-san and Sawada Mio-san. You know, Lala-san's classmates."

"The two perverts who fondle everyone they run into?!" Chisame yelled, startling everyone around her. "The runners ups to Haruna?"

Negi nodded in silence.

"Oh my God, why did you never tell me that?!" Chisame began to panic. "What did they do to you?! They, they didn't take you aside and did this-and-that to you, did they?! Did they-!"

"Chisame, please!" Negi tried to calm her down. "I don't know what are you talking about! They were very friendly and gave me a warm welcome to Mahora, even after I sneezed on them!"

"THEY WERE NAKED WHEN THEY BEGAN TOUCHING YOU, TOO?!"

Chisame was interrupted from further screaming by Mashu's own sudden screams of _"YOU, YOU, YOU MEAN YOU DID WHAT WITH SEMPAI?!"_ This was swiftly followed by mocking laughter from Mordred.

"Ah, sounds just like his mother," Arturia said.

Illya smiled and snapped her fingers. "Sayoko. More popcorn!"

"On the double," the maid dutifully said before walking away.

Meanwhile, somewhere else, Momioka Risa stirred, trembled back to life as we understand it, and stepped back from the paralyzed Anthy she and Mio had been molesting, rubbing her nose in utter confusion.

Yes, her Perversion Sense was just THAT powerful. Trascending time and space, yo!

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

D'Eon raised their head further in alarm. "Did someone else," they asked, "hear Mademoiselle Shielder's faint cry in the distance?"

"I'm sure it's just your imagination," Da Vinci told them before asking Urd, "okay, so we have established you are a Divine Spirit after all. You hail from the Singularity where our primary Master and his core team of Servants are right now. And in that world, a separate time continuum accident has just happened, leaving the whole world encapsulated in a state of paralyzed time flow."

"I thought I was the primary Master!?" Ritsuko gasped.

"Not until you finish off all the Infinite Pancake," Roman said. "You're still under probation, remember?"

Ignoring her stoically, Da Vinci kept on asking Urd, "Then, why are you here? What do you want from us? Thus far, Divine Spirits haven't gotten themselves involved into Chaldea's missions without a good reason, even with the fate of all mankind at stake, so what moves you to approach us after all this time?"

"I had good reasons and I did get involved!" Artemis protested.

"You only came here to keep messing with me!" Orion reminded her.

Again, she roughly scrapped her knuckles on his head. "Daaaaarling, you're very funny, but this isn't the time for your jokes, please!"

"I want out of this abusive relationship," Orion grumbled.

Urd sighed. "Okay, I don't know what kind of crappy gods you have in your respective worlds... no offense, Artemis, you're a different case... kind of... but in our world, at least some of us kinda like to lend a hand when the beings who pray to us get way over their heads. No big public stuff anymore, of course, the Age of Miracles is gone..." this was met with a slight huff from Medea Lily, who was now peeking from behind Ritsuko, eyeing Urd suspiciously, "but we aren't that bad, you know? My sister Belldandy literally gave everything for mankind, and like Helheim am I gonna let her sacrifice be in vain! So, as soon as I learned your mess was leaking into our world, I decided seeing if there was something I could do before our universe is kaput. Again."

"Again?" Roman said, alarmed.

Urd looked away. "Don't wanna talk about it."

"I think I like this goddess, she's human and approachable, unlike the gods of my time," the Child Gilgamesh approved with a smile.

"Aww, and now who's this cutie?!" Urd beamed, crouching down to pet his blond head fondly, making the boy laugh. "So adorable! What kind of Heroic Spirit are you, Hon?"

"I'm Archer Gilgamesh, King of Uruk!" the little boy smiled proudly. "But everyone calls me Gil-kun!" he smiled. The air seemed to sparkle with infinite hope and happiness.

Urd instantly pulled her hand away as if it had been suddenly coated with poison. Leonardo was surprised to find the goddess suddenly standing behind her. "Oh, okay, nice to meet you, then..."

"Please relax, as I come from the point of my life before power went to my head and clouded my judgment," Gilgamesh bowed politely, grabbing her hand and kissing it, making Urd slightly uneasy. This kid reminded her somewhat of Negi, and that was not such a good thing all things considered. All in all, it was a small wonder Skuld hadn't fallen for her teacher yet. "You can trust in me no matter what! Unless I'm forced to drink from my aging potion, something Master agreed never to do anymore!"

"How was I to know you'd become such a prick, all I wanted was not feeling like such a Shotacon!" Ritsuko said. "Anyway, I still think, if I give you even more, then you'd grow up to the days when you were wise and benevolent, then there'd be no-"

"Ritsuko-chan, for the last time, no!" Roman vetoed the idea yet again before exhaling and telling Urd with a weary smile, "We'd be very thankful to have your cooperation, even if it can't be that open, Urd-sama. Just tell us what do you want us to do, and we'll do it as long as it's in our power!"

"Nothing is beyond our power! We have the greatest might of SCIENCE at our avail, we cannot be stopped!" loudly boasted the gaudily clothed muscular lion-man at the back of the crowd, raising an arm in victory.

Urd stared blankly at this freak, then back at Leonardo and Roman. "You have a really weird place here, guys. Anyway, what I need is establishing a containment point for our, ah, Singularity. You see, previous intense time and dimensional displacement activity in our realm, repeated violations of the temporal and dimensional barriers, and Thanos killing off half the universe last week before we barely managed to retcon it back together, have left our reality unstable. I'm not blaming you guys, you couldn't have known before dropping by to save us, but if these things keep happening, our reality might collapse on itself, or the timeline could end up leading to the future of UQ Holder, or some catastrophe like that."

"UQ Holder...!" Ritsuko shuddered. "I don't know what that means, but it sounds horrible!"

Urd nodded. "Anyway, to stabilize the Yggdrasil System, we need a proper Goddess Triumvirate to take care of the Yggdrasil Servers running our universe and run a de-bugging purge. The last one was fifteen years ago when Belldandy disappeared, and one is long overdue now. The problem is, Belldandy is not available anymore, and neither is our sister Skuld, who was demoted recently."

"Who was Skuld, again? The little child with the siscon complex?" Artemis asked.

"Yeah, she went on her own in a half baked plan to free Bell and got herself blacklisted," Urd said. "The three of us used to run the System together, but right now I'm the only Norn Operator left. I tried getting Peorth, but it seems I can't synchronize with her, and Eris-chan is on Mundus Magicus duty making sure Aqua doesn't screw it up even worse by… well, being Aqua. Maybe you can do it in a pitch, Artemis?"

Artemis frowned thoughtfully. "I must warn you, I'm no good with computers at all..."

"Leave everything to me, you only have to do whatever I tell you. Just like when I helped you to pass those tests in college, right? We had good synch back then, we should make it work this time too."

"I suppose you're right," Artemis guessed, "but that still leaves us one member short. I'm afraid most goddesses in my pantheon are currently unavailable except for our Eris, and she's always so difficult to work with...!"

"I know," Urd said, pulling a small relic out of her Victoria's Secret Storage Department, making Ritsuko lean ahead to get a better view, "but don't fret, I'm sure we can summon an adequate third member here with this. Your facilities should help, since they seem designed to summon the best multiversal history has to offer."

Young Gilgamesh stared at the trinket Urd had just pulled out into sight and recoiled violent. "Oh, no, please, not that! Anyone but her! Lady, this is an awfully bad idea, there must be another way...!"

"We need," Urd smirked, a green eye gleaming as she pointed the way, "a fitting container for this great Spirit! Show me your best, Chaldea! Give me a great body to rock the world with!"

Astolfo blinked. "That was so dirty-sounding!"

"Yeah!" Ritsuko gasped. "Boy, ain't she great?!"

"Masterrrrrrr!"

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"S-S-Suh-Sempai, how could you?!" Mashu sobbed, her bangs obscuring more of her face than usual as she faced Ritsuka, a hand on her mouth, trying her best not to cry and failing miserably given the puddle she was standing on. "Lending your virgin lips to Mo-san and Marie-san like that! I thought you weren't like your sister!"

"Why can't anyone ever call me 'Mordred-san'?" Mordred wondered aloud in annoyance. "Mordred-kishi? Sir Mordred? Those all work too!"

Ritsuka gulped. "Please try to understand, Mashu! It wasn't my idea, I told you there's a perfectly sound and reasonable explanation! I had to kiss them on the mouth to repair the magical watch that has stopped time all over the world!"

"Yes. Perfectly sound-sounding, that," Illya nodded.

"It's almost repaired by now!" Sailor Pluto brightly exclaimed, holding the Cassiopeia up by its chain. "It actually undergoes self-repair faster than I expected, one more kiss could do it after all!"

Assassin smiled, rubbing his chin. "Well, fortunately we have another good candidate for the task right here, now…"

Ritsuka glared at him. "For the last time, Assassin, I'm not kissing you no matter what!"

"I meant Shielder-dono, Master. Please stop confusing me for Astolfo-dono."

"I-I don't want to kiss Astolfo either, w-why do people keep s-saying such s-silly things!"

"Wh-Whu-What?!" Mashu gasped. "NO! I, I mean, it's not like Sempai disgusts me or anything, or that I'd rather kiss his sister, far from it, she's kind of scary, b-but I can't keep contributing to Sempai's moral decay! That will only result in Kiyohime-san killing him even more cruelly than before!"

Mordred whistled while innocently polishing Clarent with a piece of cloth. "Oh, I don't know, I can think of ways to spare Master from that… Berserker's wrath."

Illya nodded. "You're a man of great insight, I like that!"

"Illya, stop being a bad influence on my son, he has enough of those in his life," Artoria said, looking sideways at Chisame out of the corner of her eye.

"I'm not going to praise you for being a marginally less horrible parent than you were ten minutes ago, give it up," Chisame said blandly.

Lancer sighed. "This wouldn't be such an issue if only the solution fell were in my King's hands. He was never one to reject the kiss of a maiden. At the same time, I can readily understand your reluctance, Master. Love polygons will always end in disaster, Master…"

Artoria half-smiled at him. "Yes, I can see why you would know that, Diarmuid."

The Lancer gasped at her. "Lion King! How do you know—"

Artoria gently gestured at him to calm down. "I once battled a different aspect of you, although also assigned to the Lancer class. He was the opponent I respected the most back during that War, so I'm confident you will prove being just as reliable and honorable. It shall be a pleasure, fighting by your side should the need arise."

Mordred shifted suddenly jealous eyes to Diarmuid. "Oh, so he was a better comrade in arms than me, wasn't he…?"

"I never said that," Artoria pointed out. "Just that he was the most worthy new adversary I met in that War, where you never were Mordred."

"Well, excuse me if I couldn't make it to fight at that War by your side, Father!"

"I never implied that was your fault!"

"Diarmuid?!" Negi's head snapped aside from where Chisame was frantically questioning him. "You mean, like in Diarmuid of the Love Spot?!"

"Never mind that now, dummy!" Hasegawa all but wept, waving a small Negi doll in his face. "Show me on this doll where those two weirdos touched you! Show me!"

"Isn't that Iinchou's customized doll, Chisame?" Satomi squinted suspiciously at him. "Why would you carry it around, and where were you keeping it anyway?"

"So, all you have to do is kiss each other so we can at least be free from this bothersome situation and proceed over to the next stage of the story," Sayoko was patiently explaining to the beet-faced Mashu.

"A-Absolutely not!" Mashu and Ritsuka cried as one.

"That's perverted and immoral!" Mashu said.

"And I'd get Mashu killed off by Kiyohime-san and Tamamo-san!" Ritsuka added. "And lectured afterwards by Raikou-san, too!"

"Y-Yeah, I'll protect Sempai with my life, but I won't ever kiss him against his will!"

"It would even bother Mo-san and Marie-san, right? Right guys?!" Fujimaru turned to his first two Ministra Magi.

Marie blinked adorably. "Master, I've made it clear to you I consider the Rank of a Master equal to that of a husband. If I don't mind you having other Servants, why should I mind your having other wives? It's far from the most ideal situation, but _c'est la vie_. As my family says, make love, not war. We conquered Europe by making lots of love, after all!"

"They did," Pluto said, nodding knowingly. "They really did. Lots and lots and lots of it."

"A-A Pactio is not like a marriage at all!" gasped Negi, who had good reasons to be wary on the subject.

Marie shrugged. "Well, then that's one concern less off your shoulders. Isn't that wonderful, Master?"

"It's barely less of a concern that way…!" Ritsuka sobbed. "Seriously, Sensei, just kiss Pluto-san already and let's get done with it!"

"No," the Senshi firmly said.

"Not only are you trying to hide behind a kid again," Asuna accused the Master from another world, "but even I realize if Negi does that your other two Pactios will be pointless! If Negi solves the mess that way, when he could've done it from the start, then you kissed those two girls for nothing! Then you won't have even that excuse to show that Kiyohime girl who has you so scared!"

Ritsuka gasped in realization. "N-No way, you're right…!"

"Of course I am!" Asuna smiled smugly.

Mordred huffed. "I don't really care much. I mean, it's not like it's gonna matter two years from now on."

Shielder flinched visibly at that while Marie stared in confusion at the Knight of Betrayal. "What do you mean with that, Mo-san?"

"Don't I even get a 'Monsieur Mordred'?!" Mordred growled. "You're French only when it suits you?! Anyway, never mind what I said, it's nothing!"

"Austrian by birth," Marie corrected happily.

Ritsuka stared harshly at Mordred then, but said nothing. During the Camelot singularity, he, Ritsuko, Mordred, Gawain, Bedivere, the Saber Lancelot and Cursed-Arm-Hassan all had learned from Da Vinci and Roman that Mashu's lifespan wouldn't hold past two more years, but they had all agreed on keeping it a secret from the other Servants. Even Ritsuko had been adamant on keeping this promise, and for Mordred to treat it so casually now, that made Ritsuka very silently disappointed on her.

Perhaps Artoria suspected something despite lacking any context, as she coldly looked back and forth between her son and her… son-in-law before sighing. "It's your decision and only yours, Shielder. Then again, this world belongs to those who inhabit it, and its safety falls on our shoulders alone. On that, I would agree it would be for the best if the Professor and the Guardian of Time handle this on their own."

Negi nodded, ashamed of himself. "You're right, Saber-san. I'm sorry this has brought you so much discomfort, Fujimaru-san, and you as well, Shielder-san. I should have—"

"No, it's okay, I suppose," Mashu sighed, still blushing but now speaking in a quiet tone of resignation. "I think I understand everything now, and we can't let a child like you take the weight of this, can we, Sempai? So, alright, I'll do it if Sempai is fine with it, are you, Sempai?"

"Uhhhhh…" Ritsuka said.

"He agrees," Shirou translated.

"How can you know just like that?" Negi asked Emiya.

"Trust him, they speak the same language after all," Chamo mumbled, just as somberly resigned as Mashu while drawing the new circle on the ground. "I only hope I'm not getting paid in weird foreign moeny just 'cause you guys come from another dimension. Most ermine banks don't accept transactions made with money from another realm, and those they do, well, the procedure's a bitch, lemme tell ya…!"

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"This isn't going to work," Gil-kun predicted, far more somberly than was his custom. Here, he paused before rephrasing, something his older and brasher self would never have done. "Or rather, it's going to work too well! The relic is good, I remember it clearly, but Miss Urd, what you are bringing upon us is just—"

"What _we_ are bringing upon us, Gil-kun," his Master tenderly reminded him, taking a moment to pat his head fondly before facing the cryo-stasis capsule, large enough to comfortably hold a whole human body inside, planted before her. They now stood in the middle of Chaldea's titanic cold storage rooms, where they had placed the grievously wounded survivors of Lev's bombs until proper medical help could revive them. Or the power ran out, whichever came first. It wasn't like they were hurrying, after all. Of course, they could always have just summoned Doctor Frankenstein to do the job for them, but Da Vinci had strongly vetoed the idea for some reason. Oh well. "Well then, what are we waiting for?" she grinned.

Urd nodded stoically, standing back after placing the golden bracelet on top of the capsule. It was something she had won on a bet against its original owner long ago, and she'd never imagined she'd have to part ways with it, much less this way, but it was for a good cause and that was what mattered. She walked back to join the attentive crowd of Chaldean Servants and faceless, non-important employees who silently watched over the proceedings while the Phantom of the Opera played fittingly ominous organ at the back.

"Maybe we should set up some nets?" Gil-kun suggested, eyeing the doorway out. "Really, a few annoying-goddess countermeasures wouldn't be amiss…"

"You go, girl," Urd finally approved, and braced herself.

"Really, as the reigning expert on dealing with this goddess, you people should really listen to me more!"

Ritsuko gathered a deep breath. Then she began chanting the well memorized words, standing over the summon circle drawn on the floor right before the shiny metallic container. " _Let thy body rest under my dominion, let my Fate rest in thy blade. If thou submittest to the call of the Holy Grail and if thou wilt obey this mind, this reason, then thou shalt respond.""_

Astolfo stared, aghast and yet prey to a morbid, wide-eyed fascination, at how the marks appeared on the back of his Master's closed right fist. No matter how many times she did it, it never ceased to be miraculous and mesmerizing… just like most of all other things she ever did, especially behind closed doors and in private. The air around them grew heavier, smelling slightly of gas, and the circle beneath her began to faintly glow in scarlet. She actually was doing it!

 _"I make my oath here. I am that person who is to become the virtue of all Heavens. I am that person who is covered with the evil of all Hades. Thou seven heavens, clad in a trinity of words, come past thy restraining rings, and be thou the hands that protect the balance-!"_

The red haze grew almost blinding as Ritsuko tightened the fist up and squeezing the sharp gem in her palm, a single drop of blood falling from her hand, touching the circle and making it burn to life, its blinding light engulfing Ritsuko for a second, forcing Astolfo and most of the others to step back. Only a few of the boldest ones, like Iskandar, Oda Nobunaga and Ozymandias, stood perfectly still where they had been before, smiling in anticipation, sneering in contempt, or pondering in cold grim contemplation, respectively.

And then their ceiling exploded with an earth shaking boom.

"I knew it!" Gil-kun lamented. "That's an ill omen! We're doomed, I tell you, doomed! She brought along the huge cow!"

"I'm not fixing that crap, it's all I'm telling you guys!" Kintoki protested, repeatedly pointing up at the large hole above them. "It wasn't my fault this time!"

"Hush, you fools!" Urd commanded, waving a hand before this great collection of mankind's best, all of whom, of course, were but children even to the dimmest of goddesses (that is, Aqua). "Look! It's worked after all, what did I tell you? Behold, the glory of my—"

"OW! Medammit!" loudly complained the figure within the capsule as they tried to stand up, hitting their head against the semi-transparent lid of the coffin-like structure.

Urd glared at Da Vinci. "Did you forget to open that thing before we started this? Really?"

Leonardo glared back. "It can't be unsealed a single moment as long as the body inside stays in hibernation, otherwise its vital functions would collapse immediately! Would you have been able to summon a Divine Spirit within an already dead body?"

"Well, no, most of us are rather picky about inhabiting corpses," Urd had to admit with a sigh, pushing Ritsuko aside and stopping before the capsule, pressing a sequence of buttons on it until the lid was lifted from the inside, and out stood a curvaceous, naked young female with fair skin and long dark hair flowing before her. Ritsuko swooned instantly; she had seen this girl from afar a few times during their lessons and she always thought she was a knockout, but of course, she was so above her level she'd never had a chance with her. And now she was supposed to be her Master…? There was a damn good side to multiversal crises after all!

"I am," the naked girl aloofly announced, standing with the all consuming poise and royal attitude of those well used to rule, "Ishtar, Goddess of Beauty and Love, that without peer or parallel! Fear and obey my edicts or regret and cower in sorrow, you mortals! Oh, and Urd, Artemis," she quickly added with even more noticeable contempt. "Don't tell me this is another of your pranks, we left college long ago. Or, is this for a reunion party I hadn't been told about? Why am I never told about these things? My anger shall flow like a raging river!"

Standing behind Da Vinci violently shaking his head to himself while hiding his face in his hands, Gil-kun lamented bitterly. "All is lost, all is lost now, everything we struggled so much for…!"

"Um, no, sorry, it's not that," Urd sighed, casually wrapping a robe around Ishtar's borrowed frame, a gesture the other goddess accepted with a subtle nod of appreciation, although not a terribly fond one. "You see, we had need of your services to get ourselves out of kind of a pickle we have going here, so I thought I'd call on that favor you owed me, and made this girl here to summon you as a Servant. You been keeping yourself up to date, right? So you've heard about Servants and Grail Wars and-?"

Now ignoring Urd altogether, Ishtar stared coldly at the blissfully smiling Ritsuko, who had small pink hearts fluttering all around her. "So. You are my… 'Master', then?"

"Ah, ah, yes, that I am!" the girl nodded very quickly. "I'm a Master to many, mind, so you're in the best of hands! Yessir, if someone's got experience at being a Master, that's me! Almost everyone in this room is my Servant, I'm just that damn good! You couldn't have asked for a better—"

Lifting a hand to impose silence upon Ritsuko, the reincarnated goddess looked all over those assembled before her, paying a special, smirking attention at the golden topped boy trying his best to avoid her gaze, and then looked down at herself. "This body you have found," she said, "is nowhere the peak of my divine grace, but I'll admit that, for a daughter of the human race, it is the best this species could have provided. I must say, just this once, I approve of your choice, Urd."

Urd chuckled. "I made sure to pick the top graduate of this facilities, nothing but the best for an old buddy," she boasted, tapping a hand on the name of the young woman engraved upon the capsule. "So you're going to help us, alright? For good old times sake, and mostly, for the sake of that one you still owe me?"

Ishtar smiled dangerously at her. "Tell me what you wish from me."

"First of all, let's take a bath the three of us together, to better bond as Master, Servant, and very close mutual friend!" Ritsuko drooled, holding her hand up and showing her new Command Seals off, ready to make use of them any moment now.

"I didn't mean you, Mast—" Ishtar then groaned, rubbing the bridge of her own nose up and down. "Something's wrong, here. It seems this body's influence is making me more tolerant of disrespect than ever before. Normally, I would have annihilated you over your insolence already, but now, I can't help but even want to agree…"

"Oh wow, so you're telling me all this time I only had to go and ask her?!" Ritsuko gasped. "Boy, I sure wish I'd known earlier!"

"I'll be in my room, please don't call me until the dead inevitably get loosed from the underworld to feast upon the flesh of the living," Gil-kun muttered to Alexander-kun, then began trying to sneak out through the back of the room.

"Oh, by the way, Gilgamesh!" Ishtar called out then. "Come here, will you?! I want you to give your own opinion on this body!"

Gil-kun abandoned all pretenses of stealth for they were utterly lost and tried to run for the door while screaming, but sadly, escape was impossible even for him. There was only so much Chaldea to run through, after all.

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"Well, are you guys going to do it, or what?" Chamo urged, tapping a foot. "I'm gonna grow roots here!"

"Be quiet," Ritsuka said, clearly upset at the little pest, his general saintly patience skipping a beat, "are you that way every time your Master kisses anyone? You can't rush something this important, it's Mashu's sacred first kiss after all!"

Mashu only looked away bashfully, feeling too embarrassed as to finally tell him that technically, his sister a had lready kissed her quite a while ago during the Orleans crisis.

"Look, I understand the need to respect a girl's feelings, and I hate agreeing with Chamo on anything," Chisame reasoned, "but the sooner you swallow this poison down, the better, believe me."

"Any tips you can give us?" Ritsuka hopefully asked her.

"For the love of God, it's just a kiss, you don't need a freaking manual!" Chamo shouted. "You lean close together, your lips clash, that's it! A kiss!"

Matoi looked at Artoria. "Maybe you should do what you did for him and Mo-san?"

"Mor-DRED!" Mordred snapped. "Mordred! There are other letters after the 'O' you know!"

Artoria nodded. "I think that'd be for the best…"

"Saber, this is something they've got to do on their own," Shirou chided. "And really, it wouldn't net you any extra Good Father Points either."

Ignoring the chit-chat, Chisame instructed the almost tearful Mashu, "Listen, kid…"

"She's older than you," Sailor Pluto spoke.

Chisame kept on ignoring. "What I did was close my eyes and block Negi's with my hand. Then you just imagine you're going to eat a snack or something like that, and your mouth swoops down. From there, it's easy, only hold the pose for a moment and then pull back. Before you know it, that's over, like getting a vaccination shot, see?"

Negi blinked. "Oh, so that's why you nibbled!"

" _What_ did she nibble?" Satomi asked suspciously.

"R-Right, avoiding visual contact, that sounds like it's helpful, thank you," Shielder gasped, still terrified out of her wits. She faced Ritsuka again, and they still hesitated before he closed his eyes and puckered his mouth. "B-B-But what if I wanted to see his face as I do it, I mean, n-not like I want to, not because he's disgusting or anything, buh-but because it's not proper, but if I wanted it, then I think it's important to get a clear memory of this important—"

"Just do it already or I do it for you! For Chaldea!" Mordred roared, putting a hand on Mashu's scalp and the other on Ritsuka's.

"Good to see, at the very least, you aren't the jealous type, Mordred," Artoria observed blandly. "And that you take after me, after all."

"Sh-Shut up, I don't want that kind of praise from you!" Mordred said, while Mashu sighed sadly, placed her fingers over Ritsuka's eyes, and then, without closing her own, leaned ahead to capture her Sempai's mouth into hers.

"Pactio," Chamo grumbled.

"Wow, Chisame," Satomi told her roommate. "She's braver than you after all!"

"Well, yeah, hardly shocking, she's older than me after all!" Chisame grouched.

And then the circle under Mashu and Ritsuka's feet exploded in a major burst of golden light.

* * *

The world flickered. In the back of Negi Springfield's mind, it flickered, all of it, right after that fateful Pactio kiss unfolded right before his and his closest friends' eyes. It was funny, in a way; he had been at literal Ground Zero of several Pactios before, and the ensuing backlash of raw power flowing over him had always been potent and momentarily stunning (especially with Ayaka!), but this one had rattled him with its discharge of pure power to a degree none of them, not even his own, had ever managed before.

Now he was coming back to his senses, gradually, finding out he was resting on a shiny, clean and cold floor, that of Izumi-san's infirmary. The dim hope it had worked, that they somehow had managed to break free from their self-inflicted time trap thanks to Fujimaru-san's noble sacrifice, hit Negi almost as gradually, making him unsure- should he feel well for the greater good, or bad for the important inconveniences brought upon two new friends, no doubt good people? It wasn't the first dilemma of this kind he'd experienced, and it certainly wouldn't be the last either, but right then and there, despite everything, it felt like the most important of them all.

Then, of course, something else, something even more important, reasserted itself through Negi's foggy mind. Chisame's safety. Like a primal instinct cutting through every layer of his psyche with urgent ferocity, it moved him to push himself up, growing even more nervous as he heard a vaguely familiar voice lamenting only a few steps away from him.

"Oh no no no—" Sailor Pluto was choking out close to Negi, and she was the first thing he saw as he finally managed to open his eyes. Kneeling on the floor, so close he could have touched her by just reaching over an arm, she stared fixedly at the shiny Cassioppeia in her right hand, her face pale, the Time Key barely held in place in her other gloved hand. "This won't do, what have we done—"

"Pluto-san?" Negi coughed, working back to his feet. From the outside of the room, he could hear birds chirping, and all four walls were untouched, as they had been before Heracles, Mordred and Artoria had begun fighting. Izumi-san was coming back to her senses on a nearby chair, holding her groggy head in a hand, and Illya stirred back to consciousness as well while Berserker, already fully up, gently tried to help her back in his own clumsy fashion, hands that were almost as big as her struggling as to not break her with their touch. Most important of it all, not that he fully realized it yet, Chisame also seemed to be okay, shaking her head while sitting up between a moaning Matoi and Satomi. "Is everyone okay, if so, looks like we've done it—"

The Senshi of Time turned her haunted gaze towards him, her clear eyes strikingly wide and empty. Negi flinched, since he had not seen that kind of eyes in any face ever since that horrible evening at the burning village and th last time he'd made the mistake of making eye contact with Itoshiki-sensei. "Okay?" she said, her voice low and nearly cracking. "Oh, no, Sensei, we aren't okay. I'm afraid we've brought chaos upon this world. Chaos that will consume everything… Again."

Mordred, her helmet covering her head again, got up as well while growling, her voice once more more threatening through the dense metallic protection. "What are you babbling about, wench? It looks to me like we turned time back! Wasn't that what you wanted? Look, this place is like new once again!"

"No," her father disagreed, helping Shirou up despite his protestations of being okay and able to do it on his own. "Lady Pluto is correct, something feels amiss here. I cannot describe it properly, and yet…"

"It's probably just the sensations of our nervous systems re-adjusting themselves to the perceptions of a recently altered reality, and the resulting consequences over our digestive processes," Hakase groaned, taking a hand to her own stomach. "As it is, I'm regretting having enjoyed such a substantial breakfast…"

Shielder frowned, crouched over the fainted again form of her Sempai, who lay knocked out on the floor, with her brand new Pactio card on his chest. It depicted the Servant of the Shield in full black armor regalia, holding Lord Camelot, and under the image, it read- _SHIELDER- Mashu Cyrielite- Errant Servus_. Grabbing his sweaty hand tightly, she grimaced. "I think… I can feel it too, Saber-san. I don't know how to describe it either, however."

Ako slapped herself a few times, patting her cheeks and yawning, then shook her head and tried to clear the cobwebs off her eyes. She had only vague, confusing memories of the last hour or so, but she thought she remembered the part about Negi-kun's sister and her ancient male stripper bodyguard coming over to wreck her infirmary and get her in trouble with Yohko-sensei. She blamed the rest of her confusion and dizziness on the heat and exhaustion, even though she hadn't actually worked all day long so far. But then, going through major time and space shifts always exhausted her, it had been the same way when she had travelled to that world where all of her classmates and herself were in kindergarten. She felt like that right now.

"Oh, you're all back, and… you brought some friends along, I hope?" she mumbled, shaking her head one more time. "I mean, I hope you're friends. If you came for medical assitance, I can do that too, just give me a second while my head stops spinning, please…"

Negi sighed. "Rider-san, Shielder-san, Assassin-san, Lancer-san, this is Izumi Ako, another of my students. She was with us when time was stopped, but after the Orphans attacked us, we had to take the fight away from her…"

"Are you alright, Negi-kun?" Ako staggered out of her chair towards him, touching one of his cheeks with a hand. "You look like you've just taken a beating, and… um, why deos that man have his head in a paper bag?"

"It is a most tragic and complicated story," Lancer sighed, "but if sharing it is needed to stop the flow of questions, I suppose—"

"No, thanks, we'll just assume it's for the best!" Chisame firmly said, unwilling to go through yet another round of long extended flashbacks. "Okay, Pluto-san, just spill the beans already! We obviously set time back, so what's the problem? We didn't go back in time to another century or anything, so don't tell me we changed the past so Nazis conquered the world, or that kind of crap! Stop looking traumatized and be direct, will you?! If it's nothing important, I'll just go away already and try my best to forget anything of this ever happened!"

Sailor Pluto sighed, finally rose back to her feet, walked up to one of the windows, and rolled the curtains up, without saying a single word.

That made everyone present gasp in shock. All but Ritsuka, who kept on contentedly sleeping on the floor, his head resting on Mashu's soft lap.

That lucky, yet sad bastard.

* * *

It was as if a gigantic, god-like Negi had just appeared in the skies, loomed over everyone, and then sneezed all over Mahora, except nobody seemed to be caring at all. The crowds happily frolicked, strolled, and chatted along the streets, happily partaking together in the celebrations under the colorful banners, the lurching dinosaur animatronics that passed by, and the gaudily designed zeppelins slowly floating over the grounds…

… all buck naked.

"Ohmigosh!" Ako blushed, covering her mouth with a hand. She immediately remembered one of the incidents back during the last transdimensional crisis, that of the dimension where clothes had never been invented, and turned her eyes to Sailor Pluto's now stoically grim face, receiving a dry nod as confirmation of her unspoken question.

"Yes," the Sailor Senshi somberly said. "It seems we haven't restored the timeline properly just yet. Instead, when we turned time back, elements from a previous or parallel timeline swept into our own. And this is the result. I could feel it as soon as I arrived, since I have been here before!"

"Th-Then, how did you disguise yourself back then?!" Chisame gasped, belatedly covering the open mouthed Negi's eyes, while Shirou hastily turned around and fidgeted. After the initial shock, Artoria had just regained her usual composed expression, while Asuna discreetly eyed some of the men outside with interest. "No, wait a second, what do you mean there were other timelines before our own?!"

Sailor Pluto sighed, closing the window again, which made Asuna groan briefly. "Back then, we Senshi would just put on masks, of course. It's not like anyone was looking at our faces, and technically we covered more of them than we do now. Or did. As for your other question, well, time is a complicated thing. It's not truly a linear progression, being more of timey-whimey ball of… stuff. There are several timestreams running concurrently, and yet they follow each other, often redoing events from those that came before. Imagine, if you will, two different TV channels running, at the same time, a movie and its remake…"

"We're a remake?" Matoi moaned. "No way! The depths of my love for Chisame-sama can't possibly be a rehash of something that happened before!"

"Actually," Pluto said, "this is the first timeline where you fall in lust with her."

"It's not lust, it's DEEP LOVE! But, well, that makes more sense, then. We'll agree this is a remake that improves upon the original, then, like the second Spider-Person movie, instead of making it worse, like that movie Qu4rtet!" She paused. "Then who was I in DEEP LOVE with in my previous lives?"

"Your teacher, Itoshiki Nozomu."

Matoi cringed. "You mean I never grew past that…?! Poor Ai-chan, too! But mostly, poor me!"

"S-Stop thinking about that, Tsunetsuki!" Chisame sputtered. "We've got to set this right… again! I can't live in a world like this, where Mahora is a freaking nudist colony!"

"Not only Mahora, the whole world," Pluto pointed out.

"That's even worse! And it doesn't even make any damn sense, what is this, Anime Addventure?! Okay, let's just find another Servant Sleeping Beauty there can kiss so we can—"

Then the front door went open, and a bare naked Risa walked in, blood all over her front from a truly MASSIVE nosebleed and supporting herself on a Mio, who was wearing only her glasses and the bands that kept her pigtails bound together. Ako screamed and ran out of the room. "Um, hello, is Yohko-sensei here?" Mio asked as she pushed the door in. "Sorry to barge in, we knocked, but looks like you couldn't hear us over the sounds of your discussion! Risa-chan is, ah… What are those things you have on?" she asked, blinking, instead of going for the logical questions like 'Why are you in armor, why do you have a paper bag on your head, and why is that man taller than this building?'

Risa stirred, fully opened her previously half-glazed eyes, and gasped at the mostly embarrassed-looking troupe. "Ah!" she gasped. "I knew it! Clothes are a thing that exist, after all! Not that I'd mind too much if you were to take them off now, though, but it's great to know I hadn't been hallucinating! Uh, I'm feeling lightheaded. Wow, this is a first…"

The stunned Chisame's fingers slipped down Negi's eyes. Negi stared, yelped, and quickly spun around to look at the wall. Illya looked down at Risa's lower section and merely huffed. "Huh. Natural sandy blonde, I see!"

Chisame roared furiously, violently took the Cassiopeia from Akagi's hands, and began to violently fidget around with it. "No! Wait!" the Guardian of Time gasped. "Don't treat it like that, there's no way of telling what can you do!"

"It can't possibly be any worse than this!" Chisame growled, throwing all Genre Savviness to the wind as she struggled to set the Cassiopeia back rather madly, and then the world was engulfed by another blast of pure golden light… 

* * *

**To be Continued**.

* * *

 _Omake!_

Somewhere in nudist Mahora, a happy Kiryuuin Ryouko strolled through Mahora with her smiling older sister Satsuki, her laughing and doting mother Ragyou, and their glasses-wearing father. Her adopted sister Nui waved her umbrella, asking for cotton candy as they met up with her girlfriend Mako.

What? Someone might as well get a break.


	7. The Subplot that Time Forgot

"Okay, we shall never speak of this again," Chisame said as soon as the burst of light from the latest alteration to the time and space continuum had passed. "Not the nudist thing, not the funny animals one, not the one were everyone is Superman for some reason but only one person in the planet can repair bikes, not the one where for some reason everyone is obsessed with P***mon, and ESPECIALLY not the one where… yeah. If anyone else mentions it after this point I will take it as proof of consent that it's okay to beat them to death with my sceptre. We all agree?"

Sailor Pluto took a look at the Cassiopeia now firmly held in her own hand again, thought it over, shrugged, and then everyone shared a massive sigh of relief before nodding. All but Ritsuka, who had slept like a log through the last three subjective hours of gigantic existential whiplash-inducing mayhem. Even the hardened Servants were all too happy to pretend nothing of that had ever happened.

Except Negi. "Not even…?" he began.

Chisame hefted her sceptre. "Not EVEN!" she said levelly. Everyone else nodded.

"… right," Negi's shoulders slumped down a bit. A world where humans and dinosaurs coexisted together and he couldn't even talk about it? WAH! "So, um, Ako-san, about those blood samples…"

Izumi nodded. "As soon as you leave, I'll call Mikado-sensei and ask her to run extensive tests on them, Sensei. Anyway, I'd say you'd have felt any negative effects through the last few hours that never happened at all if you had been actually poisoned, so I'd hazard a guess that you're all right."

Then someone rang at the door, and the Servants, Shirou, Sayoko and Negi, as one, readied themselves to do battle again, but Ako, before anyone could stop her, simply walked up to the door saying, "I'll answer it, never mind" before opening it. "Oh, hello, Haruna-san, looking fine today."

"Saotome-san!" Satomi blinked, seeing the mangaka standing at the doorstep in a black and white flower-print bikini that, much to their surprise, was nowhere as daring as one would have expected from Haruna. It was only her idea of preparing them for a shock, though, as she had increasingly skimpier pieces of swimwear for the next two days. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh hey, Negi-kun, Satomi-chan, everyone!" the black haired young woman waved. "Ah, Illya-chan's here too, and even Sailor—Aw crap, things are even worse than we thought, aren't they? Anyway, Negi-kun, we were calling you, but we kept on getting weird interference. Iinchou really wanted to come, but she just couldn't leave her post, so she told me to hurry over here or else…"

"Ah, right, Haruna-san," Negi nodded, then coughed. "Marie-sama, everyone, this is Saotome Haruna, another of my students. Haruna-san, this unconscious gentleman is Fujimaru Ritsuka, a... well, a visitor from the Chaldea Institute, and these are his associates. This young lady is Mashu Kryrielight-san..."

Haruna leaned curiously towards Mashu, adjusting her glasses, which were glinting under the summer sun now. Mashu instinctively pulled back a little, feeling a slight variant of the usual sensation she had whenever close to Medb-san or alone with Ritsuko. "Why, he-llooooo," the younger girl said. "Tell me, are you related to the Miyazaki family by any chance?"

"Um, no, sorry, I don't recognize that name," Mashu gulped without really knowing why. "I'm afraid I'm kind of an orphan you see..."

"Oh, that still leaves a lot of doors open, Nodoka's dad apparently had kind of a very wild youth that still lasts to his bitter old age." Haruna rubbed her chin under Chisame's sizzling glare of mounting rage and then said, "Have you ever thought of dyeing your hair dark purple, Kyrielight-sempai? I think you'd look better that way!"

"You already have a Nodoka, Haruna!" Chisame finally barked.

"Nonsense!" Haruna huffed. "There's only one Nodoka, _and_ you never can have too many Nodokas!"

"You realize those two statements are mutually contradictory, don't you?" Hakase asked. "Besides, wasn't your grandmother named Nodoka as well...?"

Haruna blinked. "Grandma? Satomi-chan, my _mom_ is the one named Nodoka!"

Her classmates and teacher paused a moment to take that in, then silently stared at Pluto, who again shrugged stiffly and just gestured at them with a hand to keep it going. In reluctant silence, they obeyed, much to Haruna's piqued puzzlement.

"Ooooo-kay," the doujin author said, since they had made no attempt at being subtle about the byplay, "you haven't been taking any of Mikado-sensei's weird medicines while here, have you? That's not the way to go through your first time, guys, not that I know it firsthand or anything, but I've heard the detailed, juicy rumors…"

"Okay, you're starting to make our class look bad before strangers again!" Chisame told Haruna. "Stop doing that already! You're creeping Nodoka-sempai out!"

"My name's Mashu!" Shielder eeped.

"I'd stick with 'Nodoka' if I were you," Mordred opined. "It's not a great name, but it's still better than something that half the time sounds like 'Mash' and half the time sounds like 'Matthew'."

"Oh, I'd never call her the latter, no way I'd ever mistake someone with these with a Matthew," Haruna shrugged, pointing at Mashu's substantial chest area, which caused the Demi-Servant to blush and bashfully hug her own breasts, as if trying to Mashu, I mean, Mash, I mean Matthew, I mean mash them against her torso. But by then Haruna already had capriciously moved on to ask, "And by the way, why's that guy hiding his face under a paper bag? This some kind of kinky roleplay or is it just a really cheap Amazing Bag-Man costume?"

"See, I TOLD you that was a real superhero!" Asuna declared.

Negi sighed. "Haruna-san, maybe you should sit down before I explain things in better detail, as much as I'm able to anyway..."

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Seven**.

 **The Subplot that Time Forgot**.

Based on the (sometimes based, sometimes not so much) original works by Akamatsu Ken, Nasu Kinoko, Kodansha, Type-Moon, Sunrise Studios, and others.

Edits, Proofreading, Extra Material, Random Excuses, Specialized Procrastinating, Bad Ideas, Lesbian Incest, Het Incest, Loli Lesbian Incest and Popcorn by Shadow Crystal Mage.

* * *

"Ohh-kayyy, that's very interesting then," Haruna decided as soon as Negi finished his tale the best he could. To his credit, few could have spun that sort of weird story (minus the parts they had all just promisd to never, ever talk about) in any linear, understandable fashion, and Chisame and the others were fairly impressed he had pulled it off. He certainly told it better than we just did. "And that sempai is the luckiest bastard in any world, then!"

As this was said with a blatantly evious look at the bed where Ritsuka currently snored blissfully, Shirou rubbed the back of his own neck awkwardly. "I wouldn't be so sure about that. Yeah, basically he's been thrust into the role of the greatest hero of all times, and that's just plain wonderful and enviable, but I'm not sure he's up for the task or wants it that much…"

"Hey!" Mordred, Mashu, Diarmuid and Marie said at once.

Artoria nodded. "There's truth to Shirou's words which cannot be denied."

"MY Master has proved himself far more than YOURS, Father!" Mordred bared her teeth. "How many campaigns have the two of you cleared up together?!"

"To be fair," Assassin conceded, "usually it is Ritsuko-dono's forces that pull most of the weight through our campaigns. A samurai is slave to nothing but the truth. The sole reason she is the secondary Master is her lack of discipline, and morals, and ethics, and scruples, and impulse control, and—"

"Really?" Haruna blinked. "She sounded like a really cool gal from what you guys told me. I'd like to meet her myself! I feel like we'd really get along!"

The day was so sunny there couldn't possibly be any ominous thunder in the distance, but some animatronic dinosaur roared in the distance at the same time, and Chisame interpreted it accordingly with a groan of despair.

The Chaldea Servants, experienced veterans all, took two steps back from Haruna.

"Ah, that reminds me," Negi perked up. "Despite everything, I've got to go meet up with the Black Rose Baron, the time of our duel is almost up! There's no way to tell what kind of involvement he could have in these affairs if I were to leave him unchecked, so I have to check up on him now!"

"Who the hell are you talking about now?" Mordred demanded.

Chamo sighed. "It's his sister, who came from Wales in drag, posing as a mysterious anti-hero of the night, and invited him to a date at Dinosaur Land under the pretense of a duel."

"Mister Chamo, please stop those ridiculous allegations already," Artoria stoically said. Like a fellow citizen of the Isles with massive guilt complexes and family issues, she felt it was her duty to stand up for Negi no matter what. "Saying the Black Rose Baron is the Professor's sister is like saying Miss Misora is the Mysterious Sister, or that I am related in any way, shape or form to that dashing highwayman of yore, Mysterious Heroine X."

"You're still playing at being Mysterious Heroine X?!" Mordred gasped in horror.

Artoria kept her poker face while Shirou facepalmed. "I was never the dashing highwayman Mysterious Heroine X, the outlaw who roamed our country championing against wrongdoings when the King's legal arm could not touch an evildoer because of technicalities. And I am not her now, either. I ignore why she would follow my steps through the unending sands of time, but that doesn't mean she is tied to me at all."

Mordred stared at her, frankly befuddled beyond reason, then asked Shirou, "Do you see why I had to rebel now?!"

Shirou stared back from between his fingers. "I still can't approve, but I can sympathize."

Negi coughed, getting up and grabbing his father's staff again. "S-Saber-san is right, there's no way Nekane can be the Black Rose Baron, that's just ridiculous! Illya-san is welcome to tag along to meet that person who is not related to us at all, but is very likely to be Father, however!"

Illya snorted. "Thanks, but I think I'll pass. Sounds like she's too pitiful to bother enacting revenge on her."

"Fath-I mean the Black Rose Baron is not pitiful at all, he's a tricky and shifty worthy rival, far better than Kotaro-kun, hmph!" Negi protested. "Anyway, girls, I promise I'll get back to you as soon as I deal with this and get the Baron to safety, as he's too brave for his own good and might end up facing the Dark Kingdom or that Grand Caster's forces alone. Please stick with the rest of Ala Alba and our Chaldean friends while I—"

"You idiot, going out on your own is too dangerous for you as well!" Chisame reminded him while Asuna, Ako, Shirou and Illya nodded. "You can't do that, we won't let you!"

Negi frowned. "But I need you to alert the rest of the team, and I'll keep a lower profile if I go alone with Chamo. It'll be easier for me to stay under the enemy's radar then."

Mordred sighed. "There might be some logic behind that reasoning, but you still shouldn't wander around with no one but the white rat. Assassin, go watch his back in your Spirit form."

Mashu blinked. "Wow, well thought out, Mordred-san! Why didn't we think of that before?"

Mordred gave a crooked proud smirk. "Oh, odds are you would've thought about it too eventually. After all, you're smart enough to remember my name's not 'Mo'!"

"I have no issues with my assignment, Mo-dono," Assassin nodded at Mordred, assuming her first Pactio partner status gave her a new added Rank over his. At least he wasn't stuck with watching over some temple's gate this time. That had been mostly deadly boring. "But I only ask you to keep the Master safe during my absence, then."

"That goes without saying, you idiot," Mordred muttered. "Just go already."

"Um, do I get a bodyguard of my own too?" Haruna asked.

The others looked at her.

"I mean," the artist said, "I've gotta go find my two best friends in the whole world, then to tell one of them, the one recovering from shattering male trust issues on her fragile psyche, that one of the teachers she respected and looked up at the most is actually a murderous serial terrorist who likes to stuff his shirts and pants with straw. I don't know if I can do this on my own, guys, I really don't," she quietly confessed, looking down at her bare feet.

There was a long, poignant pause from all sides then.

"What kind of demented school do you run here anyway?" Mordred finally asked.

"We are NOT demented," Satomi asserted. "We are a highly regarded school with a long and proud history! If you want demented, CLAMP School thinks that children's card games are dangerous full-contact combat sports, Ohtori is so fruity you can't tell the men from the women if everyone had their shirts off, and Hounouji is run like North Korea! We're the SANE ones."

"You're school is overrun by monsters at night," Artoria pointed out.

"Only because they're too scared of going to the other three places because they're filled with crazy people!"

* * *

Negi had left with Chamo and Assassin, and Haruna had departed with Asuna, Satomi and a borrowed Paper Bag-san. That left Chisame, Matoi, Mashu, the Sabers, Shirou, Rider, Illya, Berserker and Sayoko waiting with Ako for Ritsuka to finally wake up so they could just leave already. Sailor Pluto had just taken her leave with no explanations while no one was looking shortly after, which was a very Batman (and rude) thing to do, but then again, that seemed to be a general thing for vigilantes to do.

"He sure takes his sweet time!" Illya observed. "Are you sure he didn't just fall into a comma?"

"N-No, this actually happens to Sempai fairly often. He already had low blood pressure when he was recruited, and, well, taking several Servants at once puts a lot of stress on anyone's body..." Mashu sighed, gently rubbing a hand on her Master's forehead.

"Wow, are we glad Haruna's not here to hear that, even I can hear the dirty joke waiting to happen," Ako said.

"Poor guy," Shirou sympathized. "I guess sometimes, more doesn't mean better, huh, Saber?"

Mordred stared venomously at him while her father nodded in thoughtful silence. "What was that supposed to mean, you literal red-haired stepchild?!"

"Not you, _my_ Saber!"

"No fighting, no fighitng in my infirmary!" Ako chided, wagging a finger as Shirou suddenly sneezed, at which Mordred only replied with a bitter grumble and an averting of her gaze. "I mean it, the next person to take one of my walls down has to rebuild it before Sensei returns!" With this she meant Mikado, of course, not Negi.

Chisame, who understood this part, huffed. "Yeah, on that topic, we'd better leave before that woman gets here. Can't you give this sleeper a shot of something so he wakes up already, Izumi?"

Ako nodded, pulling a shiny set of syringes out. "Certainly! A single shot of this drug designed by Mikado-sensei herself, in the butt, and Sempai should be up and running again!"

"In the butt?" Shirou asked.

Ako nodded. "In the butt!"

"Untested drugs? Seriously?" Chisame cried.

"I've heard things about the drugs Mikado-sensei prepares!" Matoi said. "She's been almost booted out at least twice because of them!"

"If that's the case, why is she still here?" Shirou said.

Matoi gave a sniff, making a hefting gesture at chest-level. Every girl present looked down at their chest.

Ako shrugged. "That's why I didn't suggest this medication immediately, but since you seemed to be in such a hurry..."

"N-No hurry is big enough as to justify using Sempai as a Guinea pig!" Mashu gasped defensively, moving in between the young nurse and the prone Master. "Besides, he's immune to drugs and things because of his connection to me, so it wouldn't work anyway."

"That's nice to hear from you, I'll make sure to have you saying it the next time Da Vinci and Roman want to test something new on him," Mordred callously pointed out.

Mashu grimaced. "That... That's different, they're my superiors, I can't possibly oppose them...!"

"You know what I'm thinking now?" Illya mumbled. "That this guy's just faking it. He's afraid of waking up since he knows as soon as he does it, he'll have to summon this Kiyohime girl who has you so scared!"

Ritsuka's body shuddered visibly.

As Illya smirked to herself, everybody else leveled narrowed, cold eyes on the once again still, but now suddenly very sweaty, body.

"Sempai," Mashu finally said, matter-of-factly, "I don't look forward to it either, but you have to do it, the sooner the better, the Grand Caster won't wait for us..."

Ritsuka's body remained just as motionless, even though the sweating, if anything, only intensified.

"Master," Rider gently said, "there is no point in stalling! Why, the day when I was brought to the guillotine, I didn't stall and make Monsieur Sanson wait, that would have been simply rude! Think of poor Mademoiselle Kiyohime and how much she hates being kept from the truth. The longer you stall, the worse her anger will be!"

Unable to refute her point, the unconscious body simply rolled over on the bed, now facing the wall and trembling violently.

Illya stared at the Servants. "Are you sure you wouldn't like to have a new Master? I'm a limitless mana battery with a regal palace in the woods. Hell, I think you'd be better off even with Oniichan here. I used to think badly of suicidally running into danger, but now I'm seeing that's better than cowardly hiding from it. I might even be convinced to help him supply you with mana, at this point..."

"I'm not a coward, it's just that if I die, half of the chances of humanity are gone forever!" the unconscious body shakily claimed. "Because who would put that weight on my sister's shoulders, really?!"

Illya sneered. "See? Guys who are mean to their cute sisters are just the worst! At least Negi is very nice to his, bloody insane as she is..."

Ritsuka was resolutely unconscious.

"Oh, for crying out loud," Chisame said. "Hey, Mordred, remember wanting to see if you had a natural talent for fellatio that surpassed your dad's?" She jerked at thumb at Ritsuka. "Now's your chance."

Everyone blinked as Ritsuka disappeared.

"What are you all waiting for?!" Ritsuka called from the door. "Come on, let's go, let's go, let's go!"

"Wow," Matoi said. "It's a good thing you're definitely not a woman, or else having a man basically say he'd rather charge off to his death rather than get fellatio from you would be really hard on your ego."

Mordred twitched. "Y-Yes," she said through gritted teeth. "Good thing."

"Hasegawa-san, stop corrupting my son," Arturia chided.

"Right, I forgot that was your job," Chisame said.

"S-Stupid father! Shut up! I can corrupt myself! And way better than you can, you'll see!" Mordred declared.

"And suddenly it makes sense Camelot fell," Shirou muttered.

* * *

Somewhere else on the campus, this was happening.

"Isn't this much better than that stupid burning manpo tofu?" Nao asked as she enjoyed her caramel apple, licking it suggestively and occasionally winking saucily at random passersby, all the while walking alongside Karin, who ate her own apple much more quietly, and with far less flamboyance and phallic imagery.

Karin couldn't say it was, since she'd never enjoyed sweet things, that much she could remember. But it seemed uncalled for to tell this young woman so who, in her own way, had been relatively helpful to her so far. It had been Nao who had seduced the caramel apples away from two visiting students from CLAMP Gakuen before leaving them with a false phone number and a hollow promise of meeting later, and at no time had she pressed Karin to join her in the numerous acts of petty embezzlement and trickery she'd performed through the morning to get snack after snack, booth prize after booth prize. It was fairly obvious the young lady was rather experienced at that sort of... stunts.

The crowd was as colorful and noisy as the last Festival Karin vaguely remembered attending, although Karin seemed to remember those Festival grounds were even larger than these were, and someone getting angry. Not that these were small by any measure of the imagination; they still were impressively massive, although Karin was not an easy person to impress.

"So," Nao asked during her latest mouthful, licking candy off her lower lip, "this bringing back any memories yet?"

Karin could only shake her head in silence.

"Bummer," Nao said, and although at first Karin thought she meant her situation, then she realized the interjection was the result of Nao getting a text message, as she was frowning while looking at her cellphone. "It's from my cousins, they want me to meet them and... someone else by some stupid fish exhibition by the river. Don't get me wrong, I love my baby cousin, she's an angel, but... I don't like the cheap whores who hang out with my other cousin lately. I can't stand those bitches. Oh well," she said, turning around a corner while gesturing for Karin to follow her, "it's pointless to stall this any further. It'll make Mikan sad, and she doesn't deserve that. Besides, it's not like I'm afraid of those crazy sluts or anything. It's merely out of contempt!"

Karin was starting to guess this girl liked to just tease and use men without establishing any actual contact with them, while the other girls most likely enjoyed said contact, and that was the motive of the ill will between them. She didn't doubt Nao didn't fear the other girls personally, but she was fairly sure by now she, to some degree or another, feared what they, whoever they were, stood for. Of course, that went aside as well. After all, Karin didn't enjoy the company of such people either. She couldn't say she had found a kindred spirit in Nao, but she at least could understand her position.

"I'll give you this, you're a damn good listener," Nao was telling her now, waving the stick that was the only part that remained of her caramel apple. "Everyone, even Mikan, just keeps babbling at me to clean my act and all that crap, like they knew better. The fuck they do! I tell you, if I had a yen for every time I run into some idiot who-"

"Look out," Karin passively warned a second before bland but strongly pushing Nao back at the same time something... no, someone dropped from above and landed on her feet right before them. For the first time since her arrival here, Karin experienced a sharp, unmistakable sensation of a crystal clear memory coming to her mind, although it was far from being a pleasant remembrance. Then again, wasn't that always the way? "You!" she said.

The other black haired girl who had just blocked her way and Nao's, making several heads turn around in the crowd, simply nodded at her with a grim, even bitter, scowl on her beautiful, fair-skinned features. Karin's ill sensation grew further, not because she actually disliked the young woman she'd never expected to see again- while they never were close friends, Karin acknowledged she was a far better person than herself, certainly far more loyal for starters- but because just facing her made Karin feel much worse about herself. And Martha surely wouldn't make it any better now, saying something like-

"I had heard stories, rumors from folklore, that you had been cursed with immortality over your sins," Martha, that unexpected ghost from the past, sternly told Karin, holding her long cross-staff before herself, just as Karin calmly did the same with her mallet. The crowd began growing more interested, several chattering among themselves as they sipped from their cans of soda and munched on their hot dogs. Nao only stood back, frowning in perplexity. "I hadn't wanted to believe it, but it seems, after all, your sins were great enough even the Lord's mercy wouldn't spare you!"

"They were indeed," Karin nodded evenly, accepting her own fault with no reluctance. "Your presence here, on the other hand, is far more vexing. Shouldn't you have gone to your reward long ago?"

"Serving the one you betrayed is the best reward, and that's what I'm doing now," Martha told her. "However," and here she, much to Karin's shock, lowered her own weapon, still scowling, "I won't add to your punishment unless you force me to. What were you doing with that young woman? Turning her down the path of vice, or trying to spare her from a fate like yours?"

"Actually, we only were killing time while eating candy," Karin truthfully replied, since she liked to assume she had learned her lessons on lies and duplicity.

Martha just kept staring at her with the same thoughtful frown, so Karin realized she had to do her own part as well, and lowered the mallet too. "I agree we shouldn't fight," she said, over the sounds of several onlookers suddenly booing them. "He wouldn't have liked it."

"So you are now actually trying to live through His principles?" Martha asked, stern but not fully hostile anymore.

"It's the least I could do, after what I did."

They looked at each other in a tense silence over the next few moments, while Nao pondered just slipping away without a word while she still could. But then Martha only sighed, nodded, and extended a hand towards Karin. "There will be no violence without provocation."

Karin smiled as she shook the hand. "I appreciate the sacrifice. I know how much you've always liked to test your strength."

"D-Don't say that!" Martha protested, while several onlookers only threw their hands up and went their separate ways muttering about wasted time. "Violence is always the last resort, not a thing to do for fun! And you!" her head snapped back towards some of those walking away as soeone sneezed in the distance. "For shame, taking delight in expectations of violence between women! Your religion wouldn't approve of that either!"

Karin managed a vague smile, somehow. "Despite everything, it's good to see a familiar face again, even if it's yours, Martha."

"S-Same here," the other girl had to admit uneasily. "But don't call me that in the open, please, now I go by the name of Ruler..."

Karin blinked. "What? You, hiding under a false name? From what I heard of you back then, you didn't do that even when chased into exile."

Ruler sighed. "It's a very long story, I'm afraid."

"Oh. One you shouldn't feel at ease sharing before my current companion?" Karin guessed, gesturing towards Nao, who was now really regretting not leaving while she had the chance.

Martha looked over Karin's shoulder at Nao, and then frowned again. "No, actually, we already know each other. Good morning, Miss Yuuki. How have you been?"

The girl she had met several nights ago, when she mediated in the conflict between Ala Alba and Zastin's alien forces, groaned in annoyance. "Coulda been better, coulda be worse. The usual, you know..."

Right now, she would have even preferred it if those two had started fighting each other instead. Damn, what had happened to traditions anyway? It used to be, whenever two armed people with a shared people met in a crowd, there'd be a crowd pleasing rumble, dammit! Even foreigners knew that, it was a universal principle! Bleeding hearts, these two, they didn't even act like the old timers they surely had to be...

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"So that's the whole extent of it, huh," Ishtar mumbled, arms folded as she sat at the head of the large main meeting room, much to Da Vinci's quiet annoyance. The goddess tapped fingers on the surface of the table thoughtfully, before nodding at Urd's report. "Yes, I can see why that would be such a big deal. I'll help, of course! After all, if we lose mankind again, who will worship and pay tribute to us?"

"You're forgotten by modern civilizations, though," Kid Gil huffed from where he hid behind Urd's own chair, which had been his until that morning. He didn't even really mind anymore as long as this new goddess could keep herself between him and Ishtar.

Ishtar smiled sort of wickedly. "Gilgamesh, there is a near infinite amount of worlds, which means we are still worshiped and respected as befits us in several of them. Should this Grand Caster of yours eradicate all of human history, however, all of them will be gone, and I won't allow for that! The Great Flood taught me well, and I always learn my lessons for good, oh-ho-ho!"

"Well, that's good to hear, I guess," Artemis said, "but what are we supposed to do about it?"

"Since we lost all communications with Ritsuka-kun, there's no choice but to send a second in-site team to the Singularity," Da Vinci sighed. "We only can hope Solomon will not attack us during the absence of both Masters, but should that happen, we'll try and recall you immediately."

Ishtar nodded. "I'm fine with that, it's been so long since the last time I visited mortals! I never imagined I'd actually miss them," she mused, while Gil only kept glaring at her suspiciously, "but I believe I do, now. It's like you say, you don't know what you have until you've lost it, huh?"

"Right..." Urd nodded back, remembering how she had never properly valued Belldandy before losing her, either. It was funny, though, how this new body seemed to be coloring the Ishtar she knew, hopefully for the better. That young woman's own personality was another of the reasons why Urd chose her for a host, not that she would tell Ishtar that. "Well, with this trinity's divine protection, any plan we come through should be perfect, but how do you want to do it?"

Ritsuko blinked. "You mean you hadn't thought of the hows yet?!"

Urd shrugged. "I did say I had just ran into the emergency myself, didn't I? Besides, I wouldn't possibly come up with a whole plan by myself, only to force it on my... good friends. That, I'd only do to Skuld and Peorth. So, Ishtarin, how do you want to approach it?"

Ishtar stared at her. "Don't ever call me that again, I'm warning you. But, since you took the effort to ask for once, I'd say the best way to achieve our goals will be through an extended ritual on the ceremonial grounds themselves. That way we can purge all negative influences and smooth all the bugs in the system at once! And that would take care of Solomon's local forces and your time anomalies at the same time."

"I like that, it sounds very economical and doubly efficient," Ritsuko smiled and nodded. "Ah, but will Da Vinci-san be okay with that, too...?"

Leonardo sighed. "I see. It is highly risky to trust outsiders, but looking over this proposal, that is a small problem. Let's make a special exception and delegate command of this singularity to you, Ishtar-sama, Urd-sama."

"Not me too?!" Artemis protested.

"The situation isn't that desperate yet, I guess," Orion chuckled.

"No, no, of course you will be needed, it's just Urd and I will be the ones calling the shots," Ishtar matter-of-factly said, making Gil to mutter even more muted declarations of defeat and hopelessness and his aging potion.

"In other words, I'm only a pawn instead of an equal partner!" Artemis sobbed.

"Just go with it, A-chan," Ritsuko said, laying her head on the Servant's chest and nuzzling. "For me...?"

Artemis chewed on her lower lip. "Okay, Rit-chan!"

"Now, the ritual will needs participants," Ishtar added. "First-class Heroic Spirits who have strength, cooperation, and mutual bonds. I'll have pamphlets printed with the entry requirements, so they can be quickly spread among your forces in order to decide on our contestants. Though you'll be on the side of the management, please read over the rules carefully yourself too, Master. In order to make the competition more exciting, we can't do without appropriate management based on appropriate rules, so please fire yourself up for it!"

Ritsuko gaped. "Competition?!"

"Fouh-fouh?" asked Fouh, who sat on Ritsuko's head quite comfortably.

"What do you mean with that, Ishtar-sama?" Roman asked. "What's a competition got to do with any of this?"

Ishtar chuckled. "Fu, fu! Rituals can take many forms. Sacrifices. Dances of dedication. Sending jewels in by registered mail. In this case, it means that I have thought of the ritual in this form. Yes, this ritual, if we were to sum it up in a word- It should be a race! The singularity-spanning Cannonball, Ishtar Cup, is about to be held!" she proudly announced, pointing up at the skies (actually at the ceiling) with a powerfully sweeping arm.

"I knew it," Gil mumbled miserably. "You only want to play around, don't you..."

"It sounds like something from a non-canon screwball comedy manga," Orion said blandly.

"No, actually, I like the sound of it," Urd said. "It even meshes with some of the plans of my sister for this event, too! I guess strange minds do think alike after all..."

"The world Urd hails from is currently wrapped in a tumultuous summer battlefield of love!" Ishtar tightened a fist. "As a goddess of romance and war, this is a dual call I cannot refuse! We can achieve our shared goals easily by basically carving traces of magical energy into the land. But it'd be pretty bland and boring just doing that, so let's make it into a race! Just like the one Urd's sister is about to stage! Goddesses need to have both composure and a playful heart, after all, so I approve of this great project! Let us take advantage of it by defeating darkness through the power of Summer Love!"

"You don't even know the first thing about actual love!" Gil cried.

"Neither do you, you unmarried virgin!"

"So... this is basically an elaborate excuse to go take a summer vacation on that world before it collapses, right?" Ritsuko asked. "Not that I mind too much, but since this mess started when a goddess took a vacation, maybe doing it all over again, don't you think maybe that only will-"

"You'll get to see lots of very attractive people of both genders in skimpy swimwear," Urd said. "Mahora is many many things, but a bedpan of ugly fellows, never."

"... I'm your woman, Ma'am!" Ritsuko dutifully saluted.

* * *

 _Mahora:_

A huge bat-shaped shadow moved across the rooftops of the residential area.

Granted, the fact it was moving under a bright summer sun took a lot of the mystery and darkness away. All of it, actually. Still, it managed to look like badass. A shame, in a way, that nobody was in the immediate vicinity, everyone in the neighborhood having departed for the day's festivities, so the majestic badassness of the visitor in smooth stealthy motion was lost to everyone. Although frankly, the Batman liked it better that way.

And as a matter of fact, there was someone watching him at some point of his trajectory. Merrily skipping over a line of even higher rooftops, a slim and petite figure in lovely pink briefly paused and looked down at this fellow strange visitor from afar from her advantageous position. Twirling her parasol over herself and opening her mouth like a cute little 'O', the blonde watched him pass by, measuring him carefully with the gaze from her single, large and purple eye. "Ohhhh, nifty...!" she softly cooed to herself before simply leaping away, following her own path towards the Festival, opposite his.

Under other circumstances she'd have loved swooping down and jumping on that unique chance to meet and slice such a famous visitor from a foreign land, but alas, not today. She was sure she'd meet him face to face soon enough away. He was bound to meddle into their business after what they were about to do, after all. So, no big loss.

The Bat felt an icy shudder run up his spine, looked up, and saw nothing but the briefest sign of something pink and small leaping away from another rooftop, going the exact opposite direction. Probably something he'd have to look into later. But now, Crane was the main priority.

And he'd just arrived to the address he'd gotten, and he swung in, through the window, thick black boots first. Wrapping himself in his shielding cape and preparing himself for the worst. There were no visible security systems from the outside to deactivate before breaking in, and knowing Crane, any of them would likely be rigged to explode along half the building at the first sign of tampering. He would have to gamble once again, and as he landed on his feet at the middle of a darkened library room, he guessed this particular gamble had paid off. No alarms had blared yet, no visible fear gas had been released so far. Of course, he had put on his gas mask long ago either way, and as he took a good look at his new surroundings, he was ever ready for the slightest sign of danger.

The numerous shelves stuffed with books were definitely in Crane's style, of that there was no doubt. Mostly old, very likely highly valuable thick tomes, the type the madman greatly favored. The furniture, old fashioned and outdated pieces that were more expensive in Japan due to needing to be imported, also matched Crane's preferences, being rather sparse; the killer had never been one for gaudy luxury and opted for dark, colorless living quarters like these ones instead.

But there was something wrong here. No traps yet. Nothing as he moved carefully through the room. For a moment he actually felt tempted to turn on the lights just to see if something happened, but immediately decided against it.

What game was Crane playing now? Even if he really had deluded himself to believe he could lead a peaceful life here, just renouncing to his private demons on his own, he still would leave his apartment booby trapped against home invaders. Crane also was paranoid (and smart) enough as to believe Batman would someday come after him...

Unless there was nothing to find here... because his actual headquarters were somewhere else.

The Batman tightened a black, rock-solid fist before starting his search anyway. He had to, even if, by now, he was mostly sure he wouldn't find anything worth his time in this particular place.

Much like Alan Rance himself, this apartment had to be nothing but a hollow public facade for The Scarecrow.

* * *

"Interesting," Karin commented as she, Nao and Ruler walked together towards the riverbank. In all honesty, Ruler probably had better things to do elsewhere, but her anxiety to see if the former traitor really was up to no good trumped even her current sense of duty. Obligations to the Lord came before obligations to the Grail, after all. "It seems the stories about our association have been greatly changed since the last time I was in this world."

"Well… you could say that, I suppose," Ruler uneasily admitted. "When was the last time you were in this world, however? It couldn't be that long ago, as I understand, your gender was changed by legend quite early into history!"

"I'm not listening to this conversation at all," Nao remarked once more, keeping her arms folded behind her back.

"I'm not sure, my memories are still foggy and often contradictory," Karin admitted quietly. "I remember facing a shadowy foe of great power threatening the whole world. Then I remember being betrayed, and suffering a sharp, agonizing pain, like that of being literally torn apart over an impossibly long time. At the same time, I have vague happy memories of spending time with some fools. Probably at a hot springs house."

"Sounds like you spent some time living inside of some crappy shounen manga, then," Nao observed. "What? Don't look at me that way, my uncle draws them for a living, everyone in the family buys them out of obligation!"

Ruler shook her head sadly. "You are a troubled young woman, Miss, and I pray you find the guidance you need so much."

"Thank you, but we don't believe in the existence of therapists here in Japan," Nao snarked.

"Anyway, could we please hurry up?" the Servant asked. "I'll be glad to help with whatever is bothering your cousins, but I'm also bound to heavy obligations elsewhere that demand for—Wait!" she suddenly stopped, her head whipping towards a small boy in swimming trunks running past them. "Isn't that—"

Nao blinked. "Well, it is! Negi-sensei! Hey, Negi-sensei!" she called out, as that brat's company was better than those crazy girls. "What's the hurry, kid, Haruna's chasing you?"

Recognizing those voices immediately, Negi put a stop to his sprint, the Heroic Spirit hanging invisible around his back doing the same. Ruler's eyes widened as she stared fixedly on the apparently empty air behind Negi's, while Chamo's own instincts made him twitch his nose from his vantage point on the boy teacher's shoulder. Said teacher looked back and blinked. "Oh, Yuuki-san, and Ruler-san too! How odd to see you together, but anyway I'm glad to see you, Ruler-san, there's some new development I think you should know…"

Martha nodded, frowning at the short young man. "Yes. Yes, I am sure I should be informed about that, Professor," she agreed, still staring and making Assassin move carefully, feeling great power and the instictive knowledge he was about to get punched a lot. Had they not been out in the open at broad daylight, he'd have instantly materialized to face this woman, whom he could tell had to be a worthy opponent and fellow Servant. If she reminded him of anyone, it was of Jeanne-dono, the holy one.

Negi walked up to the girls while Karin eyed him strangely. "Who are you?" she directly asked him, feeling like she should know the answer, even though it stubbornly eluded her somehow. It was like something in her own mind was keeping her from remembering, actively, and that greatly bothered her.

He blinked, not recognizing this young lady who looked like Kugimiya-san from any class in Mahora. She had to be from one of the other three schools, so he bowed formally. "Oh, sorry, I wasn't aware you were a friend of my friends. I'm Negi Springfield, English teacher here at Mahora." He just as soon waited for the reaction of sheer disbelief to invariably follow from outsiders whenever first told this.

However, Karin only took this in calm, even if also deeply pondering, stride. "Negi Springfield? That sounds remotely familiar, and yet also so alien. I am Karin, Professor. Just Karin will do."

"She," Nao helpfully informed, "is someone I found wandering in a daze naked around the church. I'm not implying anything here, but I'd say anyone who does that has to be in an altered state of mind, don't you think, Sensei…"

Ruler gasped loudly at Karin. "You were performing acts of public obscenity around the house of the Savior?!" At this, several heads in the crowd turned again, interested. "I knew it! You haven't changed at all, unless it's for the worse!"

Karin shrugged. "Maybe. I'm not sure why I was naked in the first place, although I doubt it was because of my own will…"

"Oh my," Negi said very quietly, dearly hoping this wasn't another side effect of tampering with time and accessing the nude timeline. The sooner he could get rid of this watch, the better. "Um, well, maybe you should stop by the nurse's station, highly qualified staff will no doubt take care of you there. Ruler-san, I'm in a hurry of sorts, but before I go, I must tell you in private about—" He pulled the Cassiopeia out of his pocket in his trunks and held it high. "It began with this, you see…"

And then he stopped talking abruptly, his eyes widening, as he saw someone walking towards them across the crowd, smirking beatifically, if such a thing is possible, but also with an ominous gentle air of menace, if such an added thing is also further possible. Karin noticed this person was really tiny, even shorter than that strangely familiar Negi boy, and her light blond hair was very long, in a perfect combination with her delicate pale skin and her serene, confident green eyes. She was wearing a simple but elegant one piece white swimsuit, with the word 'Walpurgisnatch', which made Ruler flinch in sight, sewn on the chest in exquisite flowery calligraphy. She also wore a wide summer hat and held a plush bunny against her flat chest, while a green haired mechanical toy in a black bathing suit from the 1920s, armed with a pair of huge knives that looked strikingly real, marched by her side, creaking with each clumsy step.

"Master!" Negi gasped. "Hm, hello, I wasn't expecting to see you up so soon! Ah, you look just great! Very beautiful choice of swimwear! Classy and demure, just like a lady, yes…!"

"Oh, hello, Evangeline-san," Nao droned, clearly unhappy to see this new arrival. "It's weird seeing you here without Chachamaru-san. Where's she?"

"Kek kek kek," the mechanical toy with the knives that were bigger than it was cackled, head tilting aside. "Who needs the useless little sister when the cute big sis can walk by her Master's side again? I'm the greatest help Master has ever-"

And then Chachazero got a real good view of the mute, livid Kugimiya lookalike standing before them, and for the first time that Negi could remember, the maniacal doll looked... shocked. Had he just imagined Chachazero going pale? That couldn't possibly be, could it? Regardless, Chachazero's arm was indeed trembling when she reached up for Evangeline's skirt, strongly tugging down on it. "Master, isn't this... isn't this..."

"Quiet, you," Eva pushed her aside with a foot, not focusing at all on the black haired girl and instead leaning closer to Negi, her curiosity picked by the golden watch he still was holding. "And what do you have there, Boya? Looks expensive for someone on a teacher's salary."

"Master!" Chachazero gasped, lying on her back in the dust and desperately struggling to pull herself back to her feet, to no avail. "You gotta listen to me, that's, that's -!"

"M-Master, this is nothing, just a trinket, ah, I won it at a raffle, it's actually very cheap, it only looks expensive…" Negi swallowed while Evangeline reached for him, pushing his blocking hand aside, and caressing the surface of the Cassiopeia with her sharp finger nails.

"You liar, haven't I taught you it's foolish to ever try and trick me?" Eva said as she pulled the watch off his hand and into hers, making it glint preciously under the sun. Nao stared at it with greedy fascination, and even Ruler was fairly impressed as well. "Don't try to tell me you won this at some cheap fair booth, Boya! It's some sort of family heirloom, isn't it? Why else would you keep it, so close to your chest, on such an important day."

"Wow, Eva-san, you're right, come to think about it!" Nao breathed out loudly, leaning closer. "That's gotta be worth a small fortune, Negi-sensei! Hey, know what, I know some good dealers at the comercial district who can tell you exactly how much it's worth!"

"It, it isn't a gift from my father or anything, sorry!" Negi surprised Eva by snatching the watch back from her hand, something he normally would never dare to do. Stuffing it back into his pocket, he grabbed Ruler's hand and rushed away through another pathway pulling her along, ignoring her protests as they disappeared into the crowd. "I'll explain it all later, right now we gotta go!"

"Whoa! Hey, kiddo, hold on there!" Nao gasped after them. "Geez, what's wrong with that freaking twerp now? I wasn't going to cheat him outta it! I don't steal from children, only from grown-ass creepy men!"

"The nerve of that Boya!" Evangeline also bristled, fists tightening at her sides. "Who does he think he is, to deny me that... thing?! Doesn't he know, what is his is mine, and what is mine is mine?!"

Then she heard a furious, long restrained hiss coming from another nearby direction, and she gave the source of that sound a rather annoyed glare. "Oh, can it, Kugimiya. Not like you can lecture me on anything, and why aren't you with Shiina and Kakizaki anyw-"

Then Evangeline fell silent, and her eyes dilatated, her body posture shifting slightly in alarm. It was the same thing she'd done two years ago, when she first saw Kugimiya Madoka walking into Classroom 1-A, only then it had lasted little until she realized the girl's identity and no one had been looking at her at the moment, so her momentary gaffe went thankfully unnoticed. This time, however, things were clearly different in more than one sense.

"You..." Evangeline Mc Dowell, the immortal Vampire Witch, downright gulped while a trickle of sweat ran down her temple.

 ** _"You!"_** Karin seethed venomously, like only a scorned lover can, and with a single smooth motion, she drew her mallet out and swung it directly at that person she had recognized.

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

"Hmm?" Emperor Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, also known to some as 'Red', occasionally 'Super Bridejin', but mostly called 'Saber' nowadays, paused on her way back from the baths, looking at the colorful poster someone had stuck on a wall since the last time she had passed by. Since she couldn't stop loving the sound of her voice, she helped the narrative immensely by saying out loud what there was printed on it, despite being all alone. "Ishtar Cup? Is this what my fellow goddess is up to instead of looking for Praetor's brother?"

It's worth remembering that, while Nero was not delusional enough as to believe she was an actual, bonafide goddess, she still held onto a massive amount of 'divine right' imperial privilege in her mind, and in Rome Emperors could be prompted to godhood by the senate (it's complicated). There was no denying her body was divine, small stature aside.

"Still," she mused while reading through the Cup's stipulations, "there's no denying we divine beings do whatever we want, when we want it. Oh-ho? Only for the strongest Servants left? Well, that certainly must include me. It'll take place at that Singularity, too! Even better, what a chance to go look for that annoying jackal so she can witness my victory firsthand!"

"Gee, are you sure you're up to that kind of challenge, though, Ne-chan?" her Master whispered seductively in her ear from behind her, startling the Imperial Beejevus outta Nero and forcing her to spin around. Somehow, Ritsuko, when she was In The Mode, had a way of sneaking around Servants and startle them easily, even though no human should be able to do that. The Assassins all found it hideously unfair and a little creepy. She never seemed to be able to do it on battlefields though, which greatly bothered Da Vinci and Roman; in domestic situations and wacky romantic shenanigans, however, it was a nearly unbeatable skill. "You're a peerless warrior on foot, but how are you on all fours? Wheels, I mean?" Ritsuko chuckled, stroking the side of her face. "We all know you're _great_ when you're on your hands and knees… "

"P-Praetor!" Nero swallowed, suddenly very conscious of the fact she was naked. What? Did you not guess? She was a Roman Emperor, after all. "O-of course I am just as good on a chariot! You might have heard fabrications about my legend, where I had to cheat to win at a race, but there wasn't any fraud at all. Not at all, okay? It's just that, when I fell from the chariot, the race just happened to enter a brief intermission for rest. There weren't any other intentions behind that!"

"Oh, okay, that's nice to hear," Ritsuko shrugged innocently, balancing herself back and forth on her feet. "But, I heard this race isn't like the ones Ne-chan used to win. I think it's going to be a race on waterbikes, against the most hardened opponents that Singularity has to offer. Expert racers well used to modern machines!"

Nero laughed. "Ah-ha-ha, is that so? Even better! Even if I hail from an era when such things did not exist, I will master them with a skill to befuddle any Rider! You know your Emperor's talents know no limits! And if it takes places in summer, on the blue water, even better! I have gotten a new swimsuit you simply will have to see! I guarantee it matches this flawless figure, impossible as that may sound! My contractor, My Praetor! Let us go enjoy a vacation together at the sparkling sea!"

Ritsuko purred, a hand on her cheek. "Hmmm. Your Majesty would look good draped in a chequered flag…"

Nero blinked, taken aback. "Oh…? I, I truly would, but you, you are a bit bolder with my person than usual, are you not? Far be it for me to question this turn in Praetor's favoritisms, but you would usually rather go after Astolfo, or Blavatsky, or my rival in the arts of song, or your brother's Shielder, or…"

"I used to prefer the thrill of the chase over your open acceptance, but now I see that was a mistake, Ne-chan…" Ritsuko purred again, swiftly moving ahead so she cornered her against the wall, slamming her hands on the sections around Saber's head as to close her escape ways with her arms, and blowing sweetly into the Servant's ear. "Will you allow me to make up to you…?"

"T-there is, there is nothing to forgive, Praetor! T-that was your r-royal prerogative," Saber stammered, forgetting all the times she'd angrily lashed out against Astolfo, Helena, Elizabeth, Mashu and others whenever Ritsuko would pay them more attention, neglecting her. "I could never hate you, I knew you would see the light of reason eventually, but as it happens…"

 _"For my sake and Oniichan's, become number one…"_ Ritsuka whispered into Nero's ear as she rubbed against the Servant's front.

Nero stiffened just as much as the ahoge on her golden hair and laughed dumbly. "Oi, oi-! I-I see, that means you're cheering for me alone, r-right! If you have made such a straightforward confession then I have no choice but to accept it! I shall not betray Praetor's expectations. But, upon my spectacular victory I expect a fitting reward- honour me with your best embrace then, so be prepared!"

"How about I screw your brains out?" Ritsuko said, suckling on Nero's earlobe.

"T-That works too!" Nero said.

Ritsuka then pulled back, grinned widely, twiddled her fingers together in an adorable way, and nodded. "I will, Ne-chan, you can count on that! Oh, I'm so happy, and yet so embarrassed, I can't look at your face anymore for now, tra-la-la, I'll be seeing you around soon!" she sing-sang exaggeratedly before merrily skipping away down the hall.

Nero watched her go, slowly sliding down until she sat on the floor, with golden hearts and tiny prancing Cupids happily dancing all around her head as something dripped down her legs.

Then she pumped a fist up and cried in joy. "YOO-HOO! At last, this royal body is getting some again! Far too long has passed since this morning, but the moment is so close now!"

What, were you expecting a long dry spell? She's a Roman Emperor, they don't _do_ that.

* * *

 _Mahora:_

Nekane Springfield waited patiently with a saintly, radiant (TM) smile as she stood by the front gates of Dinosaur Land.

Displaying typical Springfield Preparation, she had used her Springfield Preptime, second only to Bat Preptime, to buy Premium tickets for herself and Negi the week before so they wouldn't have to stand in line. She had bought a full basket of sandwiches—nothing homemade as to not reveal her identity, even though it broke her heart not being able to feed Negi with food made by her own hands once again. She had hid her usual fragrance under several layers of Manly Man Cologne for Men, the macho, daring and yet sensible scent for today's sensitive but domineering alpha male, as her colleagues at the idol agency (remember that subplot?) had advertised it.

And she had taken good care of her physical appearance as well.

Her long hair was made into a gender-neutral ponytail, believable from a young lady, a tough rebel against the system, a man in perfect communion with nature and perfect aversion against scissors, or Rapunzel. She wore MIB-rated all-concealing sunglasses, plain sandals, a simple, long light shirt with binds for the breasts underneath, a baseball cap that magically made her seem more boyish, and long shorts, nothing sexy at all. She felt fairly confident that, despite the lack of her mask, Negi would readily recognize her as the Black Rose Baron (the black roses on the shirt probably helped), while nobody would take her for a woman…

"Hel _lo_ , mama," a shirtless street thug with shades and very tight Speedos circled around her, like a shark outta fucking nowhere stalking its prey. "What's a hot piece of ass doing here all alone when you coulda—"

Still smiling and without looking at him, Nekane punched the bothersome strange man away while thinking of Negi, and how he would make this whole day worth it.

She didn't understand the appeal of dinosaurs herself. Nekane had seen more dragons up close and personal than she cared to admit and there was nothing particularly glamorous about them, but she still understood boys Negi's age had fleeting hobbies of lighthearted natures that helped through the serious pains of personal growth. As it was, it was incredibly comforting Negi had at least some childlike quirks left, period. She'd never been that easy coping with the idea of her kid brother turning into a neurotic miniature adult. And if he had to have a childish dream, better that of meeting dinosaurs than that of becoming a professional Monster Card player, like so many other boys his age, or becoming a terrifying supervillain so that his father would finally reveal himself to stop him. Seriously, those games were creepy and heavily indicative of an absence of any social life, thought Nekane, who enthusiastically collected wool stuffed puppets of historical figures for fun and borderline obsessive completeness. Her opinion of them was almost as bad as the notion she had of Dungeons and Dragons. Or would be stalkers.

"What a hot Onee-sama…" Honsho (not Naba!) Chizuru purred dangerously, slithering her way to Nekane's side. "Hey, hey, Onee-sama, if they've left you waiting, what if we ego for some iced tea, my name is—"

Stoically, Nekane kept on waiting as she also punched the red-haired menace away, dearly hoping she wasn't hitting one of Negi's students. It couldn't possibly be the one named Haruna, Negi had sent her pics of her, but she sure sounded like her. Maybe it was a relative?

Sighing, Inoue Orihime picked her unconscious, spiral eyed friend from the sidewalk and began dragging her away. "And to think I was once a co-protagonist," she quietly mused to herself while disappearing back into the crowd.

Don't lose hope yet, Inoue-san. There may be a future for you in this story, even now! Of course, given the role switch, you'll probably end up married to Rukia.

"I'm almost desperate enough for screentime to go with it," Orihime said. "Come on, you gag lesbian."

Anyway, Nekane kept on thinking about dinosaurs while she continued waiting. Wade had mentioned going once to the actual Savage Land with the X-Men and that Cable fellow, to foil some evil plan or another from that Magneto person who, every once in a while, would try his best to stage a noisy comeback through the worldwide news, much like a less nefarious Kardashian (he later wrote a book about it that Oprah approved and the X-Men sued over). From the way he had phrased it, it didn't look like the Savage Land was too different from Mundus Magicus, but with dinosaurs instead of dragons. Both places had power mad magical overlords, tribes of deformed beast-men willing to take prisoners and tie them half naked to stakes over fires at the slightest provocation, ancient pyramids where beings from before the dawn of man slept waiting for the day of annihilation, and conqueror wannabes calling themselves 'Sauron' just because they once had read too much Tolkien.

Then again, maybe Wade had exaggerated just a little, she thought, ignoring that for once, if anything, he had downplayed what had happened. He made damn sure to leave out the parts with Psylocke and Storm in leopard skin thongs wrestling in a mud pit, that was for sure.

"Excuse me, Ma'am," a meek looking boy under the weight of a backpack overstuffed with anime and manga related material that was almost as big as himself approached her, "could you tell me the way to the Convention Center…?"

Without looking at him or dropping her smile, Nekane pointed in a random direction she had just picked on a whim, and ignored the boy as he bowed to her and quickly left, heading directly towards today's Gay Pride parade.

Nekane kept on waiting for her boy, the smile never leaving her lips. It was actually getting kind of scary.

* * *

The Chaldea Message Board at the main dining area was the most important spot where Servants could get fresh information and exchange impressions, opinions and death threats in the huge ultra modern facility. Of course, sending e-mails and text messages to each other would have worked just as fine, but most Servants came from the days of yore and thusly were very old fashioned. Many Archers have needed to be told off that they were not allowed to send messages by tying them to arrows. Postal delivery duty had become a standard punishment for those infractions that were not extreme enough to be suitable for 'send to Ritsuko'.

Today, several Servants had gathered around a certain section of the ridiculously wide board, on which they'd pin all sorts of notifications, requests, mutual prana recharge offers, memes, the latest 'tasteful' artwork by Leo, announcements of future events, Master Quest requirements, practical jokes, the latest amendments to the lists of Things Not To Do and Things To Keep Ritsuko From Doing, and Nursery Rhyme's latest desperate plea for more people to come to her tea parties every morning. Without Beowulf and Kojiro back yet, the board was sorely lacking on the habitual open calls for duels to the death, but they'd found something else to entertain themselves with.

"List of accepted applications for the Ishtar Cup?" Nursery Rhyme read aloud curiously since she loved reading but hated it whenever she couldn't decipher the meaning of any given text. "What's this supposed to mean?"

"Haven't you heard?" grumbled the Berserker Vlad the Impaler in all his imposing, foreboding majesty, while casually handing Rhyme the latest set of very cute pink mittens he'd lovingly knitted for her. "It's an idea of the newest Servant, that wench claiming to be a goddess. Master Ritsuka was lost to a Singularity again, and apparently the way to save him is setting a vehicle race against the locals while half-naked."

"The Gods must be crazy," pondered the Sakura Saber, Okita Souji, while by her side, the black clad Demon Archer, Oda Nobunaga herself, rubbed her own chin pensively, going through terrible plans of conquest and carnage in her mind. Also, bigger boobs.

"This sounds very interesting indeed," smirked the Rider Queen of Connacht, casually tossing some of her long pink hair back. "My unbeatable chariot, naturally, should be unstoppable in that sort of contest! This is a challenge I won't refuse! Also, sexual tourism! I heard people in that Singularity are hot!"

"I heard they have very cute children," the Caster Gilles mused absently while everyone but the only groaning Jeanne Alter stepped further away from him. "Oh, it is not sickening when it is Master Ritsuko saying it, is it?! Besides, my intent is not to molest them, only to slay-"

"Gilles, Gilles is being disgusting again!" Andersen cried, calling for the Saber.

"Hold your tongue before I forget the truce, knave!" threatened Vlad, who at the very least had a few standards left. "Hmph, here it says only Nero has enrolled so far. Naturally, that attention craving attentionwhore would jump on the first given chance at the spotlight. And she calls herself a ruler of men!"

"I think she just wants to see Tamamo-san again," Boudicca commented. "They might act like they hate each other, but they won't stop trying to be together over and over…"

"Oh, if the harlot is in, then so I am!" Elizabeth Bathory, the self-styled idol singer, said. "I cannot let an inferior singer win the hearts of that audience while I linger in the back! I'm going to make that Singularity my biggest stage yet!"

"Hu fu fu, that's my line!" boasted Nobunaga while Okita flinched in dread. This reaction wasn't totally unexpected, but Sakura Saber had hoped Oda's latest flights of fancy might take her another, closer to home, way. "But, if those vermin are to learn about real music, then your disgusting saccharine pop won't do! They should be schooled in the ways of Metal instead!"

"And here we go again," Okita sighed miserably.

"Metal? The only Metal thing about you is the density of your skull!" Bathory sneered. "So those horrible sounds coming from your room are your music practices? I thought it was you submitting your roommate to your deviancy!"

"Are you sure you are the one to speak on the subject of deviancy, Lancer?" Chief Geronimo asked.

"Of course I am, I practically wrote the book on the subject!" Liz said proudly.

"No, Miss Carmilla did that. You don't even have a draft," Shakespeare said.

"Way to miss the point," Boudicca said, while taking another look at the long sheet of glossy paper. "So, if we want to take a stab at this, we must head over to Da Vinci's lab and ask for Ishtar-sama 'The Mighty And Ever Beautiful'… hmmmm. I don't know, but if that Saber's involved, then I shouldn't leave it unchecked…"

"That is one technologically advanced world, isn't it?" Edison asked. "Then I want to experience it myself, it's been nothing but backwater worlds to visit of late. I crave for more advanced knowledge to learn!"

"Why, so you can swipe it as well?" Tesla asked back. "You'd have to understand it first, and I'm not going to explain it to you!"

The lion man turned on him, baring his sharp teeth. "Weren't you just claiming you had surpassed the gods, arrogant fool? I doubt Ishtar will let you in her game with that kind of attitude!"

"If she won't, then I'll just make my own way in, it's not like I need her so-called divine help for anything!" the other inventor boasted, getting on his face.

"Both your attitudes need a lot of adjustment!" Helena snapped at both. "Behave like the men you are, already! I can't believe we still have to go through this every day!"

"I cannot either, Madame," Edison respectfully said, "but I wouldn't have to defend myself if he wouldn't start it every morning…"

"Talk about starting it, will you?!" Tesla protested. "Well, if we want to get technical about who started anything today, I'd rather blame the one who snuck into my room while I slept so he could spray lion pee all over my latest experiments!"

Edison looked away innocently. "How can be you that sure that was lion pee? It might have been Mister Fou's. And you should get yourself better locks, but I suppose I shouldn't expect for more from an inferior developer."

"Edison," the tiny Caster dryly chided. "Don't ever do that again or I'll be forced to start considering having you spayed."

"Aye, Madame."

Meanwhile, Boudicca was already before Da Vinci, slamming a filled-in and signed application form on the desk Leonardo currently shared with a smirking Ishtar. "Here! So, I'm in now, right? That's just fair, if you allowed her in that quickly!"

Dammit, this time she wouldn't get screwed over like she'd been in canon! There had to be several openings left without 'those other characters' in the Chaldea lineup for this continuity!

"We'll think about it…" Ishtar teased maliciously.

"RRRRAARRRR!"

"Of course, that kind of attitude is a nice start, so you shouldn't have any real problems making the grade. And it's not like you lack the visual appeal factor, that's a sure thing…!"

* * *

 _Mahora:_

"But, surely someone must have kept watch over the tanks last night?" Natsumi insisted, having taked the lead on questioning the dopey-looking, even dopier acting older boy in charge of running the attraction. It was a pimple-faced, lanky and gangly young man of around seventeen, with large, droopy dead eyes and the apathetic attitude to match. He sat behind the meager desk at the entrance, absently playing with a pencil as they spoke.

"Uh, no," he said. "Why would we? I mean, why waste any time watching over some fish? They aren't dead, you said it yourself, so what if their faces are like that? Even better, that'll bring more people around, right?"

Natsumi sighed, exasperated. "Even if it's only a prank, we still should look into it, Sempai. What if it's another school sabotaging us, or worse? What makes you think they'll simply stop here?"

He groaned. "What woulda they do next? Poison the tropical birds expo?"

Natsumi threw her hands up. "Try poisoning people, Sempai! Maybe even poisoning you!"

"Why woulda anyone do that? I don't have no enemies…"

Natsumi barely repressed the urge to start tugging on her hair. Rito guessed that, if that was a common occurrence, that explained why her hair was so messy. They'd arrived a short while ago, by a call from Morisato-sempai concerning poisoned fish in a tank, and while Rito hadn't seen what was so urgent about that at first, now that he'd been told the basics he also was very wary indeed.

They'd tried to call Negi-sensei and the core of Ala Alba, of course, but somehow something was messing with communications, both through cellphone and through Pactio links, and Rito could only hope Haruna was still okay. At last, they'd at least managed to reach Nao, and Rito figured it'd be for the best if they kept her close before they lost track of her, too. So, they'd left the bulk of the manager's questioning to Natsumi, to better keep her distracted, while the rest of them hung back around the tanks filled with grinning fish.

Skuld and Lala were holding small matching devices with funny inhuman faces attached to them, running them in steady, wide circles around the main fishtank until Skuld frowned and turned towards Keiichi. "It's Joker venom all right," she told him in a low voice not disturb the rest of the visitors minding their own business. Thankfully this attraction was not that popular, and it wasn't exactly overcrowded. "The non-lethal variety that only causes the grinning rictus, but we know he isn't going to stop at this, right?"

"Oh my God!" Mikan, who had been standing by Keiichi's side, put a hand to her mouth while Keiichi gasped. "So, um, you'll have to tell the Headmaster now, right? Maybe even cancel the Festival, we aren't safe here as long as—"

"More like evacuating the whole city, I think," Keiichi gulped. "For all we know, we might be standing over a whole campus rigged to explode any second now…"

Lala frowned. "Now, now, Keiichi, don't you think you're overreacting? It's just some mere human with bad skin and a suit."

"No," the young man said without any hesitation, trying his best not to start screaming, alerting Natsumi and everybody else. "Haven't you read about this guy yet, Lala-san? He's the world's most infamous murderer! Hannibal Lecter fused with, I don't know, Gengis Khan! He's the Clown Prince of Crime! The Jester of Genocide! The Harlequin of Hate!"

"That's a lot of alliteration," Lala shook her head. "In Deviluke, whenever we have one of those bad men running around, we don't flee with our tails between our legs. We stand our ground, hunt them down, and then submit them or their pieces to the Great Imperial Justice. Otherwise, what's the point of having any civilization at all?"

"Take this seriously, Hime-sama!" Keiichi said, trying to think of how to convey the urgency of the situation. "This is someone _Superman_ is wary of! He's that bad!"

Nana sniffed, running her fingers against the crystal wall and sobbing to herself. "Poor, poor wonderful children of the sea…! What manner of fiend could deface you like this…?"

Standing right behind her, Momo sighed. "Their lives aren't in any danger, are they? So keep your head cool, Nana. Think of them as a new species if you must…"

Rito walked closer, having overheard parts of their conversation. "Hey, what's up? Something bad?" he asked, trying to keep a low tone himself. "You're all pale, don't tell me this really is…"

Skuld nodded gravelly.

"Oh, crap," Rito gulped. "W-Well, let's not panic yet, there are many more of us than of them, and we have so many resources, now we know they're here it won't take us long find—" His cellphone chose that moment to ring to the tune of 'Forever We Can Make It'. "'Cuse me a sec, please," he said as he nervously picked it up. "H-Hello? Ah, it's you, Nao. What's taking you so long, you'd better get here right now, we can't be just—"

"Do you think I'm playing around, you idiot?!" his cousin screamed at him. "What the hell's the problem with your sponsor now?!"

Rito sighed. "Now what did Negi-sensei get into?"

"Not him! Well, we ran into him for a short while too, but I mean your Nosferatu Goth Loli weirdo! She's having a street fight with this cokehead nudist girl I found wandering around the church!"

Rito paused. "… mind saying that again, please?"

"Of course I mind, just drag your ass here already!" Nao protested. "Cokehead is trying to kill her for real, and didn't you tell me she's powerless most of the time?! There's nothing I can do, it's not like I command a magical giant spider monster or anything, so you'd better bring your damn harem so they can be useful for once!"

Rito briefly considered asking about the magical spider monster, but just as soon decided this wasn't the time. "Okay, we'll be there. Where? Huh-huh, allright, just keep yourself outta harm's way, Nao. Lala!" he told his alien fiancee. "Come with me, I think Nao's in serious danger! The rest of you please stay with Murakami-san and make sure she's safe too, okay?"

"Safe from what, Sempai?" Natsumi suddenly asked, now standing right behind Rito's back and making him shriek like a girl. As he spun around frantically, he saw her face was as serious and humorless as her tone. He also registered he had just accidentally groped her chest while moving, but he barely even noticed the token slap she's just given him in response. "I finished trying to squeeze water out of that rock-head, and I find you guys babbling nonsense about someone's life in danger? What do you know about this that I don't?"

"P-P-Please keep your voice low…!" Keiichi begged, coming closer and desperately gesturing for her to calm down. "Rito-san, Lala-san, just… just go, will you? We'll handle things in this side on our own, thank you…"

Rito nodded as he grabbed Lala's hand and began pulling her away. "No, thank you. I'm trusting you with Mikan-chan, okay? Mikan, be nice and do anything they tell you, okay...?"

"But, Rito…?" his sister doubted before Momo rushed past her.

"We're going, too!" the shorter-haired twin eagerly offered, pulling Nana around, the lesser-chested sister taking a second to wave a last tearful goodbye at the fishies. "I don't know what's going on, but whatever it is, we'll be with Sister through it, this time!"

"Good girls, shame I'm an only child," Natsumi dryly approved as she watched them leave, then frowned at Keiichi, Skuld and Mikan. "Now, before you start taking me for an imbecile and trying to mislead me, I'd like to remind you my mother is a detective… A REAL one, not just a graduate of the Detective School who lives in the woods and eats mushrooms!"

Uncomfortably, Morisato looked away. "R-Really? I don't think I could be reminded of that since I never knew it in the first place…"

"Don't play dumb with me, Sempai!" the normally meek girl raised her voice aggressively, causing even Skuld to take a few steps back. "This is related to what happened in Kyoto, right? What, are they trying to kidnap Konoka-san for ransom again? Or Iinchou is the target this time? Or, or maybe it's Chizu-nee…?"

"No!" Skuld shouted. "It's nothing like that, you have it all wrong, it's just—"

Mikan sighed, then matter-of-factly infodumped, "It's all very simple, actually. It starts with your teacher, who is a wizard, and maybe I'm being unfair but surely this is all his fault when you get down to it. Then there's my brother's girlfriend, well, the one who just left anyway, who is a real alien princess and not a chuuni in cosplay like you thought. There's also the Joker, yes, the guy from the news, who's apparently here to kill us all because your classmates crossed him in Kyoto or something like that. There's more to it, like the ancient revived spirits who fight each other for some sort of sacred cup and the monsters that prowl Mahora every night looking to eat us down, but I don't know that much about all of that yet, and anyway I already told you the most important parts. Satisfied now?"

"…" Keiichi and Skuld frowned, giving Mikan matching ferocious glares, the kind that conveys perfectly the 'I wish I could stuff you into that fishthank right now' sentiment.

Mikan's own stoic expression didn't falter. "It's for the best if she learns of that now," she defended herself.

An extremely pale Natsumi assimilated this in wide eyed, dismayed silence; she choked in her own saliva, gagged and coughed several times; she made as if trying to start spinning her head around, failed at it; she then resorted to punching herself in the head twice. Finally, after taking both hands to her own throat and rattling herself back and forth in a way that greatly unnerved Skuld, Keiichi and Mikan, she calmed down all of a sudden and plainly said, in a cold and studied tone, "Okay. I think that explains most of the questions I had in mind, then. Although I'm sure it'll only raise many more as soon as the overwhelming buzz of a million crazed bees in my head stops."

"Ah, maybe you should…" Keiichi swallowed.

"It's okay. We actors are all a little bit nutty, Sempai."

"Oh. That's good to hear. I suppose."

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **Master Rangers**.

Shirou and Ritsuka had been staring at each other for quite a while now as they walked. Artoria and Mordred were starting to get worried they might be developing mutual attraction.

"There's something missing here," Shirou finally said.

Ritsuka nodded. "Yeah. I can tell we are incomplete."

"Incomplete?" Mordred echoed incredulously.

Her Master nodded. "It's hard to explain how it feels, and I don't know why I feel that way to begin with, but... look, Moe and Larry just couldn't have felt okay without a Curly, you know?"

"Or at least a Shemp," Shirou ellaborated. "I'm not going as far as to call for a Curly Joe, that's just plain wrong, but-"

"You realize you are comparing yourselves to people calling themselves 'Stooges', don't you?!" Mordred protested.

Artoria shook her head in faint dismay. "I'm disappointed in you, Shirou. I thought I had taught you to appreciate the humor of the Pythons, and yet you now gravitate towards the crass lowest common denominator of the Howard Brothers' troupe?"

"You aren't making any of this any better, Father!" Mordred yelled.

Ritsuka sighed. "Anyway, I'm sure there's someone, somewhere out there, who can make us whole. Someone to complete our team..."

"Team?!" Mordred echoed again, even more exasperated now.

* * *

Kishinami Hakuno from CLAMP Gakuen frowned at the old mirror the Festival stand's the shifty-looking salesman was offering him for cheap. "Whoever told you it was cursed anyway?"

The old man who ran the Urahara Shop Annex shrugged. "A random, desperate and dying vagrant from some distant country. In his dying breaths, he gave different versions of how he'd gotten it. Once he told me it came from a faraway land in a world of magic, where it was used to create duplicates of a Dragon Spooker flast chested sorceress and her stupid companion. Then, during another delirium, he told me he'd stolen it from Nerima, after it created an opposite gender duplicate of a powerful martial artist..."

Hakuno paused. "... okay. Look, all I want is a new mirror for my bathroom, okay? I don't believe in curses, but if you're willing to part with it cheap, I'm not protesting." He reached into his pocket for his wallet. "I'll take it for that price, it's a real steal..."

* * *

"Actually, I think I can understand the Sempai," Asuna piped in. "I used to kinda feel the same when I first came to Mahora. I'll admit I felt a lot better after meeting Konoka, and after making a regular sparring partner out of Baka Iinchou, but I still felt like I lacked some special clique to join until I met Makie, and then Yue, and then Kaede, and finally Ku Fei..."

Artoria rubbed her chin in pondering. "You mean... it's like what moved me to gather the Knights of the Round?"

"Wasn't that," Mordred scowled, "just born out of a sense of needing a strong body of expert warriors to protect your land and your right to the throne? And because the French insulted you?"

"Well, there was that, and there also was the desire to belong to a team," Artoria plainly confessed.

Mordred stared at her. "Why did I ever respect you at all, I wonder?"

* * *

"Ahhh!" Sajyou Ayaka from Ohtori screamed as she clumsily walked into someone else while turning a corner. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" She did her best Kaga Ai impression while quickly pushing herself up from the person she'd just crashed into. Adjusting the glasses back on her face, the brown haired girl gasped in realization and shame. "Oh my God, I even broke your new mirror, didn't I?! I'm so extremely sorry, I'll pay for it... Sir?"

And here she paused, for she'd been very sure she'd just crashed into a boy, and now there were a stunned boy *and* a girl sitting on the sidewalk before here, at the middle of several shattered fragments, and staring at each other in horror and shock.

Ayaka had taken these days off to escape the usual weird shit like that always happened around her at her own school. This just wasn't fair at all!

* * *

"Yeah," Asuna patted Shirou and Ritsuka's shoulders at once, like a sage older sister comforting her stupid clueless siblings. "I know you'll find that person, or those people, if they happen to be more than one, sooner or later, guys. Don't worry too much about it 'til then!"

Shirou smiled. "Thank you, Asuna-san. Hm, Ritsuka-san? If anything you look even more concerned now. What gives?"

Ritsuka shivered. "If you had a twin, you'd understand...!"

* * *

In Chaldea, Ritsuko shouted out of the blue, jolting up from her chair and swinging a fist around. "I'm the Green Ranger!" she shouted.

Ishtar and Urd blinked in surprise at the strange non sequitur, then looked at Roman and Da Vinci, silently waiting for an explanation.

They only got two jaded shrugs of shoulders instead.


	8. The Yuuna The Kid Special

Hello, I am Akashi Yuuna! Y _UU_ NA, not Yuna. That's the one from the universe where everyone is related, there's lots of incest sex (because everyone is related), Haruna is the only sane person (so you know it's a bizarro universe), and everyone is borderline clinically depressed and self-destructive. I'm the fun one and amember of world saving team Ala Alba (okay, technically no worlds saved yet, but we'll get there!), and around the time the events of this chapter happened, I was a student of Mahora Junior High (Female) Class 3-A under Negi Springfield-kun, Kung Fu Wizard. I'm the daughter of Akashi Wataru-sensei, and my mother was this kickass magical gunslinger, Akashi Yuuka. Of course, you should know all of this already, or else why would you be starting this story with this chapter? Seriously, that's kinda weird. Go back to the start and be sure to leave a review. Actually, just leave a review. We need more of those.

Anyway, it kinda felt right to start with that introduction. Even if you've been keeping up, you might've forgotten since it was mentioned like fifteen thousand chapters ago, that after my mom's death I spent a couple years with my grandma in a small South Seas island, where I had this strange really strong puppy named… Patch or something, I dunno. I wish I could remember him more clearly, I really liked that little guy. I don't even have any pics of him left, Grandma told me she'd lost all of them in a typhoon.

Whatever, after that I was brought to Mahora, where I met my BFFs Ako, Makie and Akira, and then Negi-kun, and then I was trapped in another dimension where people kept pronouncing my name wrong and ended up kissing him to gain these radical magical handguns to save my friends from a demon summoning hag (a bunch of people from another story helped). They couldn't have done it without me! I really think those chapters sell me short, if you'd actually been there you'd have seen I so totally saved the day. Ah well, after that I guess I was still a bit pissed off at Dad over keeping me in the dark about the whole magic thing, so behind Negi-kun's back I agreed to help Chao and Skuld-chan, two classmates who are even weirder than the rest of 'em, to reveal magic to the world during the Mahora Festival!

Shut up. It seemed like a good idea a the time. One was a goddess, how was I supposed to know they could be really stupid as well as sexily tsundere?

Now, you'll no doubt remember last chapter I was supposed to be with Skuld-chan and her sorta-boyfriend Morisato-sempai, who'd be a cradle-robber (not that we really keep track around here) if not for the fact Skuld-chan is actually like super old, older than mankind, man, even older than Eva-chan or Inoue Kikuko! But then, when the story focused on them again after a lot of wasting time around Servant bitches, I wasn't there at all, and you might be wondering, what the hell? Had they forgotten about the Best Character? Well no, before meeting with Lala-sempai and the others, Skuld-chan sent me to the Haunted House to alert the others about this Joker guy, since they weren't picking up our calls for some reason or another. I ran there, and that's where this chapter starts, see? So get ready, pals, this chapter is all Yuuna! I'll be narrating even the parts I'm not in, so you won't get bored! It's Yuuna time, bitches!

("Oh my God, please, let everything work out okay," Ako softly prayed, bringing her hands together).

* * *

So, this is **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice, Chapter Eight**.

I think I'm gonna call it… let's see… I know! **The Yuuna The Kid Special- Legend of the Beautiful Gunslinger!**

Based on the original _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ manga by Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha, who really dropped the ball when they didn't make Yuuna the protagonist. No offense, Asuna, but I'd have worked so much better!

("That's just plain bullshit!" Asuna cried).

Oh, yeah, and I guess a buncha other guys and gals also created the rest of the fellows showing up through this thing, too. We don't own any of them, honest.

Written by that OverMaster guy, with edits and proofreading and stuff by Shadow Crystal Mage.

 **WARNING:** This chapter contains copious amounts of Yuuna. We'd like to remind you a healthy dose of Yuuna is a necessary part of your daily diet. Don't snicker, you sickos, I don't mean it like that! Recent medical studies have certified having a steady regiment of Yuuna makes your heart stronger, your libido more potent, your teeth whiter, your shirts easier to iron, and greatly reduces your chances of ever getting the Medea Disease.

(Medea laughed. "Oh ho-ho, this mischievous daughter of mine! Isn't she lovely?")

* * *

So, since your senses will have to settle down after being exposed to an intro that awesome, let's cool down for a bit with kinda lamer people before we get back to what I was doing at the time as a father to that guy who really wants to read about the Sun Trio. Sadly, we're down one, but it will hopefully be enough. As you'll recall, there was this Lawful Evil aligned Servant named Caster, who was summoned by a really evil magus for the Mahora Grail War. I'm not saying the guy didn't deserve it, because kinky Twilight RP rape hasn't actually been declared outright illegal or anything (except the rape part, which is really bad. Don't do it!) yet, but the Caster quickly turned on him and killed him, which even if you're working for an evil fella, is still a bit… well, nasty. Especially if you were aligned Evil yourself in the first place. Just saying.

("What are you trying to get at there, dear daughter?" Medea asked, a bit less happy now).

As I was saying, this Caster dragged herself onto the road to die since she had no Master anymore, and for a Servant that's kind of a big deal unless they're in Extella and they're not Nero or Tamamo-san. Luckily for her, a really nice, soft-hearted but also kind of dense older gentleman passed by on patrol that should've been handled by Kouzuki-sensei had he not been out on an assignment that probably wasn't an assassination. Long story short, the really nice teacher took pity on this woman, took her to his home and, ah, took over as her new Master.

("And husband!" Medea proudly added).

Quiet you. Paperwork or it didn't happen!

Well. Anyway, what I'm getting in is, that morning, Dad was busy at his surveillance post, and so he left Caster home alone. While there, another Caster and a Lancer from another universe dropped by, because of course that's a thing that usually happens during a Grail War. Seriously, those freaking things are clusterfucks all around. After seeing she had no chance in hell to beat those home invaders back, making her even more pathetic than 90's Macaulay Culkin, our kinda cowardly Caster decided to strike a friendship with them (and of course set them up for poisoning and a Sudden But Inevitable Betrayal, because COME ON, she's the Witch of Betrayal, it's right there in the name!), you know, if you can't beat 'em, set them up to die later! In return, they asked for help to locate their missing Master, because again, most of these guys apparently can't even wipe their ass if their Master isn't around…

("I can vouch that's literal in a few cases," Fujimaru Ritsuko nodded. "It's one of the few things I'm not into.").

"Here," Tamamo-no-Mae, now dressed to fit in the crowd, said as she stopped in front of the small infirmary station. In the event you were wondering, 'dressed to fit' didn't mean hiding the darn furry ears and huge-ass furry tail attached to her huge ass, but calling further attention to those attributes by also wearing a skimpy blue bikini and a nearly transparent white shirt over it, allowing men everywhere to see at how the meager blue fabric stuck to her every lascivious curv—

("Your bikini that day wasn't any bigger," Tamamo-no-Mae pointed out, "and you weren't wearing anything over it at all either, period!")

Yeah, but I don't claim to be a married woman! "Here it is," said the fox woman in the already mentioned ensemble that would look perfectly okay on a single girl but slutty on an allegedly married lady, plus sandals, a big old straw hat, and a large colorful parasol swung over her shoulder. "My husband's essence can be clearly smelt wafting from this place!"

Very tempting to put a masturbation joke here, but that would be too easy.

"That must be some cologne," Medea, in a black bikini with matching sarong skirt that in all fairness wasn't all that slutty, muttered as she stood behind Tamamo, alongside the stoic shorts-and-Magnum-PI-shirt-wearing Karna, Hero of Generosity (not to be confused with the white unicorn fashionista, who is the Element of Generosity), who'd just spent his whole Chaldean allowance for the month buying cotton candy for every child they had ran into on their way there before he'd been told about the effects of diabetes and childhood obesity. "Well, I know this place. This is where one of the friends of my daughter works."

"Your daughter?" Karna repeated.

Medea nodded. "My husband's biological daughter."

"Does she even know you exist?" Karna asked.

Medea looked very irritated now. "That doesn't make her any less of a daughter for me!" she argued while her colleague in the black arts of being Caster burst in, arms spread open, with a huge smile painted on.

"Ohhhh, Maaaa-aaaaster-!" she loudly said, making sure to thrust her large chest out with her entrance. "Your Tamamo-chan is here now! Whatever brought you here, don't worry, your darling will heal it with a kiss and a nice, long, steamy-!"

Poor Ako, who was currently in the middle of trying to explain the need for analyzing some blood samples to Mikado Ryoko-sensei without spilling too much, turned her head towards this weirdo who'd just shown up, and she instantly had a very bad feeling about it. "—uwa? S-Sorry, Miss, were you looking for someone?"

Medea stayed back at the doorstep, calmly looking at Ako, whom she recognized from her time stalking me, and Mikado-sensei, whom she recognized from her time as an invisible spirit, stalking Dad to make sure he wouldn't cheat on her with someone younger and prettier.

("I only was watching over the safety and health of my dear family, even if obviously some of them weren't grateful enough towards my efforts," Medea said with a great air of wounded pride.)

Let's not even get into that. Tamamo-no-Mae stopped, lowered her arms, blinked several times, and then asked, "Where do you have Fujimaru Ritsuka?"

"Who? I can't say I've ever heard that name," asked Mikado-sensei, her bombshell figure, even better than Tamamo's, barely clad at all in a tiny black two-piece and an open lab coat loose over it. Seriously, those two melons looked just about to spill out. More than usual, I mean. "Have you, Ako-chan?"

Paling visibly even though she's already very pale, Ako swallowed hard and forced herself to nod. Be strong Ako-chan! You can do it! "Y-Yeah, I had him here not long ago, he's… a student from another Academy, Sensei. Um, look, Miss, Ma'am, Sir, he just left shortly before Sensei here arrived. Don't worry about him, he fainted for a while but he's okay now."

"Yes. That sounds like Master indeed," Karna nodded.

"Master?" Ryoko wondered aloud, raising an eyebrow in interest. Yeah, these Servants really don't stop to think what calling someone 'Master' sounds like, do they?

"W-Was he alone?" Tamamo asked, and the urgency in her tone alerted Ako. "He wasn't with a very busty and tall woman with a long spear, right? Or a shorter girl in a kimono? Or—"

"Hm, well, he was with Mo-san, Mashu-san and Marie-san, but, but he was looking very hard for the rest of you, too!" Ako tried to placate her. "Listen, they left with some of my friends, who are all very trustworthy people. Including, well, including Mo-san's dad!"

Tamamo paused in the middle of her incoming fit of frustration over losing to Shield Girl again. Marie-san was a worrying rival as well, but she'd never concerned herself too much about Mordred. Wow, really? Did she not get how Japanese guys found gap moe and tsundere girls hot? "Mi-kon? Mo-san's dad, you mean Arthur-san?"

Ako had to nod, because really, what else could she do?

"Which Arthur-san?" Tamamo frowned, seeing this local was clearly acquainted with at least the basics of Servants, and not caring much if the woman with her was not.

"There's more than one?" Mikado-sensei smiled, rubbing her chin, curious to see where this would lead to. Wow, I suddenly realize letting her and Medea meet might have been a bad thing.

Ako spoke in a very small and subdued voice. "W-Who else, her only and single, once and future Dad, Artori—Arthur-san, of course… Ummm… you must be Kiyohime-sama, right…?"

"What? No! Goodness, far from it!" Tamamo made as if to brush unwanted particles off herself, making her breasts bounce and Ako wince in automatic chest envy. "She's a respectable rival, but there's no way she would reach my level, regardless!"

("It wasn't chest envy, it was mere surprise at her violent reaction," Ako offered, and nobody was fooled).

"Anyway," Tamamo narrowed her eyes at poor Ako, who had done nothing to deserve any of this, "if he left this clinic of his own will, why didn't call for ME, his DEAR DEVOTED WIFE, as soon as he—"

"Excuse us!" a girl with dark brown hair and glasses was shouting now, walking past Medea and Karna, who allowed her in while regarding her curiously. She wasn't even wearing a swimsuit but a sleeveless shirt and shorts reaching to the knees, the prude. "W-W-Who is the doctor here, please?! We have something that, well, I guess it counts as a serious medical emergency!"

Then Tamamo, who had been previously unimpressed and only annoyed by this interruption, gasped loudly when she saw two youngsters walking in after the screaming girl, both very pale and greatly disturbed. They looked like twins, even more than Ritsuka and Ritsuko did, and stood apart from each other as much as they could, as if they were very perturbed about the other's very existence…

("Big achievement! We don't look alike AT ALL!" Ritsuka and Ritsuko protested as one. "Don't confuse us for Saberfaces!")

And Tamamo's jaw drooped, her ears flopping, her heart suddenly going into massive cardiac overload. You know, everything Servants do has to be larger than life and melodramatic, the big drama queens. "You!" she cried, her voice breaking. "After all this time, after all these lives, we meet again! Oh, oh, oh, I always knew this moment would come, but for it to come like this…!" she bawled and threw herself directly into the arms of the stunned girl at the doorstep, somehow managing a clean leap right over the meganekko's head. "MY BELOVED!"

Mikado just gave Medea and Karna a highly questioning glance while Ako tried her best to meld into the wall. Just that. She was a Mahora nurse, after all.

"I don't come with her," Medea simply said. "At least, I don't anymore."

"You have a very nice, clean place here…" Karna observed passively. "I believe even Miss Nightingale would approve of it…"

* * *

At the same time, elsewhere, Negi had taken this Ruler girl behind a building, into a narrow alley where nobody would be peeking in while they talked, and no, this isn't the setup for a dirty scene. As soon as they stopped there, Ruler shook his hand off and frowned at him.

"That was a very rude thing to do, Professor," she said, shaking her head in disapproval.

"I'm sorry," Negi sighed, lowering his head to her. Stand up straight! She's a Catholic saint and you're British, you guys seceded from them, remember? "But I couldn't tell you about this in front of everyone, and as much as I respect Master, she was bound to make things worse this time…"

Ruler still shook her head one more time. "And you!" she told the still-invisible form. "Show yourself, there's no escape for you from the eye of a Ruler, not even in that visage! Identify yourself, and state the reasons behind your interference!"

This samurai Assassin dude appeared then, bowing to Ruler. "My apologies, Ruler-dono. I did not mean to insult the capacity of your Class. I have met other Rulers before, and they were worthy opponents and allies alike."

"Explain yourself," Ruler asked. "Are you a leftover from a prior war, like Saber?"

"Actually, that's a very big part of what I wanted to tell you, Miss Ruler," Negi said. "You see…"

Oh God, we don't need to sit through another explanation of stuff we already know, right? Negi-kun told Ruler about all the Servants from Chaldea, and about the time-freeze stuff, and skipped over the nudie parts, blah blah, and no, don't ask me how I know about those parts they agreed to never speak of again. Let's just say human resolve may be incredibly strong at times but very weak at others, and that the more people know about a secret, the less safe it is, and leave it at that. Where were we? Ah yeah, then, when everything but the nudie and such stuff was said, Ruler facepalmed and said,

"Do you realize what have you brought upon this world? You have altered a very delicate balance! You can't hope to simply solve a Holy Grail War through the crude method of throwing more Servants into it! That's like trying to repair a building by blowing it up with dynamite!"

"We wouldn't be here if the Grand Caster had not made his move first, Ruler-dono," Assassin said. "Believe me, were we to leave it alone, you would be surpassed quite promptly."

Ruler huffed, standing her ground with her staff, ready to strike at any time. So violent! How'd she ever get to be a saint anyway? "Are you questioning the domain of a Ruler over her War, interloper?"

"I question anyone's ability until it is fully proven," Assassin smiled, unsheathing his sword. "I know I just said I acknowledge the power of the Ruler class, but even all Rulers I know from before, placed together, would quickly fall to the Grand Caster. Unless you prove yourself better than that…"

"Don't fight," Negi tersely warned.

Ruler clenched a not-so-holy grin, her eyes glinting. "I fight with the power of God Himself in my staff, heart and fists, faithless wanderer! If this Caster of yours is the King of Israel who strayed from the Lord, I'm sure He will now enact the judgment he was spared from in life!"

"Well," Assassin took an elegant battle stance, "you will have to apologize to David-dono later over killing his son, but first you will have to pass my test…"

"Please don't fight!" Negi raised his voice.

Ruler advanced steadily, the ground shaking under her stomps. "Foolhardy wraith! You only have yourself to blame!"

"Naturally!" Assassin agreed as he faced her. "Only a simpleton would blame the gods for his own misfortune! That is what mastering one's own fate means!"

"Do! Not! FIGHT!" Negi shouted, slamming his staff on the ground, between them, and causing a huge explosion of sparks and lighting erupt in all direction, making both Servants come to matching surprised halts. They weren't hurt in the slightest, for to Heroic Spirits even that, which would have pretty much killed any man alive, was nothing but a display of kiddie fireworks (yes, even to the laughably weak bronze 1-star servant who's only any good in the Orleans chapter), but it was enough to make them pause and stare at Sensei in muted shock.

He wheezed and panted, tightening a fist by his side. "I'm sorry!" he shouted. "But the time for petty squabbles is over!"

"This is not a—" Ruler and Assassin began at the same time.

"Yes, yes it is!" Negi-kun insisted, slamming a foot down to prove he was willing to smack the law down… even if most likely, he actually couldn't. "The safety of all my students is at risk here, and I won't compromise it by allowing you to start killing each other when we might need your combined help! God help me, if I have to fight both of you at once, I will, but I'd rather have NO fights at all between us! You think I'm making no sense now? Well, neither are you, so stop posing and posturing around like battle maniacs and start thinking of the greater good, like real heroes are supposed to!"

Assassin blinked. "But I'm not a real hero, what is your point?"

"My point is shut up and fall in line! Or I'll tell Fujimaru-san!" Negi barked.

Assassin blinked again. "… okay."

Ruler blinked, too. "Th-that is, your resolve is impressive indeed, but you speak with no knowledge of the greater forces at play here, you cannot possibly hope to impose your will, well-intentioned as it is, as long as you ignore—"

"No misleading sophism in the classroom!" Negi instructed.

"I am not your student, Saber is!"

"That is besides the point!"

"H-How is it besides the point?! Listen, I understand your frustration, but you cannot tell me what to do, I'm an appointed Servant who—"

"You have been appointed by a cursed cup on a bloody trial by combat that has left hundreds of victims every time!" Negi insisted. "I have been appointed by Konoe Konoemon, gentle guardian of thousands of young souls who have made it mostly safe to adulthood over several decades! You are overruled!"

Ruler grimaced. "That's not how it works, and we don't know for sure yet if the Grail is tainted, and even if it were, I'm not tainted myself, then I'd be an Avenger, and—"

"Irrelevant!" Negi dusted himself off. "Now, I am going to make sure my sister, the one person I might place as a higher priority than my students, is okay. You will follow me there, then we will discuss the terms of this alliance as they deserve. My apologies over this selfish delay of our ultimate goal, but she **is** my sister."

"I thought you had said—" Assassin began.

"And I will keep saying it every time Chisame and the others are around," Negi confirmed with a nod. "Now please come with me and behave yourselves properly, my sister greatly dislikes unruliness." He elegantly turned around and quickly marched out of the alley, not bothering to wait for them.

Assassin and Ruler stared at each other helplessly. "Are we letting him do this to us?" asked Ruler.

"I'm not sure. Why should I start following orders from a teacher now? I never had a formal education!"

"Neither did I, actually," Ruler had to confess.

"Then it's time you started!" Negi's voice urged them from ahead. Sighing very deeply, the Servants took their spiritual forms and meekly flowed after him.

And that, folks, is the actual reason why most of us like Negi-kun so much. So manly!

* * *

Alright! Now this is what I was talking about!

The heroic Yuuna the Kid had taken a shortcut through a narrow patch of woods between public roads. If you pay Mana enough, she'll tell you about all sorts of useful shortcuts like that, and they're very useful whenever, for some reason or another, you need traveling across campus fast and your Magister can't summon you at the time. Don't bother asking the twins or Kaede. Despite being in the Walking Club, all they really know is the best places to have sex outdoors. Well, this time, I was running towards the Haunted House, minding my own business, I mean, minding the safety of everyone in the school, when I suddenly heard this piercing scream for help.

"Help!"

See, I told you. The quick thinking Yuuna whispered _"Adeat!_ " and summoned only her incredible Artifacts, the twin guns of Justice, Dante and Virgil! Yeah, I named my guns. What of it? Chisame named her mice, and it's pretty much the same thing only my guns don't talk. I named my boobs too, but like hell I'm telling you about them, that's private. Anyway, it's easy to summon only the Artifacts once you get the gist of it. It was a procedure of trial and error, honed over many nights in the resort, but eventually we got it, just like the other Ala Alba. It makes for easier secrecy than having to summon the whole costume at the same time, you only gotta concentrate on the Artifact alone…

What? What do you mean it comes out of nowhere? It's totally not a retcon, see the original material! I don't care what over a million words in the original Unequally Rational and Emotional say, that's our story and we're sticking to it! Yup, totally not a retcon! At all! It's not a retcon! It was important, so I said it twice!

Well, yeah, going back to what matters. I ran in the direction of the scream holding Dante and Virgil, and through some thick bushes that the Narutaki twins were thankfully not having sex in (that would have been awkward and annoying) only to run into five little imps, each shorter than Negi-kun, dragging a blonde girl across the grass, taking her deeper into the woods. They were all solid black and featureless, with no visible faces on their heads, other than the detail of their large, blank, glowing yellow eyes. They wore no clothes whatsoever either, but again, they also were featureless down there, so, um, smooth as cueballs, you get me? The girl, on the other hand, was quite… developed in all her features. A lovely cute face, clear golden hair made into aristocratic ringlet drills, flawless white skin, and what a body, man, even better than mine, and that white bikini really flattered it.

I mean, I'd already had experienced with girls a little bit. I'm not blind either. She was a real hot piece of ass. Oh, look, my heretofore long-neglected sexually-experienced lesbianism is waking up!

She looked at me with her wide, tearful baby eyes while the critters pulling her along stopped, growling at me and sounding like overgrown mutant crickets with lion genes. Yeah, the sound was like half chirp and half roar. I'm trying to make this sound as dramatic as it was for your own benefit, don't start mocking me! "P-Please help! Th-They just kidnapped me off the main street!"

"On it!" I said, taking aim and letting sweet, anti-maho ammo fly. The creatures all leaped away from Cutie, rushing me in a close formation while waving their long spindly arms and sharp clawed hands at me, but that only made them an easier, tighter target. They obviously were just as smart as they looked.

The first one was hit and fell back almost immediately, dissipating into an explosion of black specks. This didn't even slow the others down, and boy, they weren't smart, but they sure were fast. I managed to hit another one, which exploded the same way, but then the others had reached me before I knew it. However, instincts gained through training took over and I spun back out of their claws' range. I aimed at one's head and shot, blowing it off as it quickly disappeared like a bad dream by morning. Another one slashed at my leg, but I swung it up and kicked it in the face, making it stagger back before shooting it through the chest. Only one left!

This one, however, it had me all but dead to rights, jumping directly at my midsection before I could take aim again. However, before it could cut through my stomach, he was hit in the head from behind, and while that barely inconvenienced it, it still turned back to look at the blonde holding a random branch taken from under a tree in hand. It made an inhuman sound that almost sounded like some annoyed question, but then I placed Dante's cannon on the back of its neck and quipped as befitting the situation.

"No, she isn't with me, but all the same…" and I pulled on the trigger. What? I'm no James Bond? Well, neither are you, buddy!

They were all taken care of now, and I rested my back against a tree to regain my breath and hope my nipples weren't too hard under the top's fabric. If they were, this girl still had the decency to look at my face while stuttering, "Th-Th-Thank you… thank you so very much, you just saved my life…! You… are you…?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I'm the daughter of Aka—"

"One of Negi-sensei's students!" she brightened up, snapping her fingers, and I resisted the urge to facefault on the grass.

I sighed. Guess there's no way helping Negi-kun would be more popular than Dad, even if it WAS a tad unfair despite everything. "Yeah. Akashi Yuuna. Thank you, too… Tomoe Mami-san, right?"

She gasped. "Do you know me?!"

You expected some cute Alice Liddell-chan? Too bad! It's was Mami-chan!

 _Well, duh_ , I wanted to tell her. _You're one of the most popular students, all boys are ga-ga over your absent head, and your parents caused that car crash that killed my friend's family off. Also I saved your life, so you cool with having sex with me?_ But I only smiled, because Ala Alba also teaches you patience. Not very well, be you either learn it or you make stupid moves on Negi-sensei, and no one wants to deal with the Blonde Morals Duo getting on their case. "Yeah, well, I think you're a bit more popular than you think. Anyway, why were these creeps taking you away?"

She blinked. "Shouldn't you know?"

"Why should I?"

"Well," she reasoned, "you knew exactly how to deal with them. Are those guns even legal here? You look like the kind of girl who would be well aware of strange paranormal things and take care of them by force, no offense intended. Or the kind who would be filming an action movie while in a bikini."

"Yeah, that's the ticket, we're filming—" I stopped myself then. Chao had warned me not to jump the gun and tell people before it was the time to, but I figured out we were going to tell everyone about magic in two days more, what was the harm in a single gal learning about that beforehand? Yeah, I was stupid back then, thank Kami-sama I'm all wise and sagely now.

("Okay," Makie, Akira and Ako all plainly said).

"No, actually, you're right, you could say I'm a butt-kicking huntress of the paranormal always out to help students in distress, other than weekends and vacations," I smiled again. "But these freaks normally don't just hunt at random in daylight, there must be a reason why they'd ambush you. Do you have any strange birthmark anywhere? Did your parents keep a lot of secrets about their background? Do you often dream of being a princess living in a crystal palace?"

"Oh, no, although sometimes I dream of shooting muskets around at horrible shapeless monsters." This girl seemed to be taking this mess very well all things considered, but then that kind of answer already told me why. "But, my psychoanalyst said it was just an unconscious manifestation of my orphanhood trauma!"

"… you're seeing a psychoanalyst?! But this is Japan! They get laughed out of business, starve and die, as is right and natural!"

She nodded. "Mandated by the School Council after… our accident. Really, it was all 3-F's fault."

Well, Mahora _is_ a school inspired by Europeans after all. I sighed. "Okay, Mami-san, here's what we'll do…"

* * *

So elsewhere, at the same time, someone was doing something so many others have ever wanted to do- coming awfully close to killing Eva-chan.

("Damn right, so many have ever wanted to," Evangeline nodded).

Right...! Not that any of **us** have ever wanted to, ahem.

("It's okay if you have ever wanted to. That tells me I have to put you through even more misery than I had previously imagined.")

Ahhhhh... Well, the thing is Eva-chan was jumping back and forth from one side to the other, dodging the angry barrage of hammer strikes from this suddenly very furious Karin girl.

"All right!" a boy with a CLAMP Gakuen accent cheered, pulling his cellphone out and starting to take video of the scene. "A real Mahora street fight! Now this is what I came here for!"

Eva-chan groaned and rubbed the side of her head while bouncing around, barely keeping herself above Karin-san's speed, much to the awe and whistling of the quickly growing crowd that was gathering around them, although keeping a prudent distance. "I hope you're happy now, making a spectacle of yourself like this. And I see you still lose all control of your technique when you get mad. What a waste of skills!"

"Silence, treacherous fiend!" the abruptly very emotional girl shouted, charging ahead only to be avoided again. "Have you grown not only duplicitous, but cowardly with old age? You never fled from any weapon, Daywalker!"

"Long story," Eva grunted before grinding back, sinking her heels on the dirt and assuming a better fighting stance. Yeah Eva-chan! 3-A pride! We bow to no bitches! "I suppose you might find it amusing, even, if only because you'd think it was fitting. Not that you'll get a chance to hear it if you keep stupidly attacking me in the open, stupid!"

Karin fumed, then looked at the crowd taking pictures and filming them and sheathed her hammer again. "Yes," she reluctantly said, "it's not the best place for this, we can agree on that much. Innocents might get hurt again because of you."

"Filming a movie, filming a movie, that's all this is, folks, make way for a crew member, please!" Rito-sempai pushed his way back to the middle of the event, then stopped by Eva's side and leaned forward, hissing into her ear. "Eva-sama, what's this?! What the heck did you ever do to Kugimiya-san's clone?!"

"Don't ever address me like that again, worm!" Evangeline backhanded him away in annoyance and proceeded to stare at the coldly bristling Karin, even as Nao-san, Lala, the living brooch on Lala's head, and her sisters gathered with curiosity behind the whimpering boy rubbing his aching cheek. "Apparently, this person thinks she has reasons to believe I wronged her after an association between us. I must admit I'd never expected to see her once more."

"You screwed her that badly, huh?" Nana asked and then bowed to Karin. "My apologies in the name of our circle of acquaintances! Please don't hold whatever Eva-sama did against the rest of us, she can't help being evil!"

"You're taking her side already, before even knowing any facts?!" Eva protested.

"But you like being called evil," Nana said, blinking in confusion. "You told us you were evil and that you were considered evil and would kill anyone foolish enough to forget you were evil. There was an orientation class and pamphlets and everything!"

"That's not what I was objecting to, you moron!"

"Are you steering even more people now, to guide them to their doom for your own benefit, Daywalker?" Karin accused. "Do you know no shame?"

"Oh, please stop making a scene already!" Evangeline barked, tossing her arms up. "You're always the same, no one can ever explain anything because you're always jumping to conclusions first!"

"Funny, I seem to recall I used to be completely patient, never daring to ask for any explanations from you, until YOU THREW ME INTO OUTER SPACE!" Karin shot back.

"So what? You got back, didn't you?"

"IT WAS HOT! Do you know how hot it is in space? You'd think it was cold, but no, IT WAS DAMNED HOT!"

"Really out of context dramatic scene dealing with surreal themes that will make more sense in the finished product, guys and girls," Momo smiled gently as she kept on trying to shoo the confused crowd away. "Why don't you wait for the movie to be out to watch it as the Gods intended? I promise we'll have the DVD and Blu-ray out by the Sports Festival! Please go visit the cosplay show, it's guaranteed to be awesome and sexy!"

"Even if I had betrayed you, which I didn't, why are you so bothered about it?!" Eva recriminated. "After all, you barely did anything but wax angstily about how guilty you felt and how karma would catch up to you, Little Miss Traitor!"

"It's not a matter of my being deserving what you did or not, but of you being vile enough as to betray our bond of love!"

"... love?" Rito blinked.

Momo tensed up from her crowd control duty, her ling black tail twitching violently. "L-Love?-!-?"

"Ah-hah, I knew it!" Lala slammed a fist into a palm triumphantly. "This is Madoka, right?!"

Nana sighed. "Why are denizens of this planet are so easily swayed by their passions? I get they aren't evolved enough, but seriously, even animals won't act like this!"

"Well, of course you would think so!" Momo huffed.

"Don't listen to this loony!" Evangeline roared, stabbing the air over and over with a finger that pointed at Karin. "She's delusional, I'm telling you! And she's also obsessive, and has an appallingly one-track mind, and she's bad enough to make Tsunetsuki look stable, and- and-!"

"Master, Chao told me I could take a couple hours off for myself," our Chachamaru-chan, in a very beautiful and practical summer dress, came in, quietly marching through the tight crowd without any difficulty, and holding several booth prizes, most of them lovable dolls and plush toys, in her arms. "So I thought I'd spend them with y-"

She came to a halt as her gaze and Karin's locked on with each other, and Eva muttered miserably, slamming a hand on her own face. Caught between the ex and the wife! What will you do now, Evan-chan!?

"Do we know each other from anywhere else?" Chachamaru-chan asked, just a bit less polite sounding than usual. Be more mad Chachamaru, Eva-chan's cheating on you!

Karin-san didn't know why she felt so compelled to attack what she saw as this newly arrived strange person, other than the facts she looked like Chachazero and she had addressed Evangeline in a very familiar way, but she felt it, and right now that was all that mattered. _**"DIE!"**_ she growled, swinging the hammer rushing aside once again.

"Hey!" someone in the crowd shook a fist. "Everyone, come back! The brawl's not over yet!"

"Oh, for the love of-!" Eva-chan yelled.

* * *

 _Chaldea:_

Oh. Oh, do we really have to do this? Don't get me wrong, I get along with most of the Archers and some of the others, but remember when this used to be a Negima story? Didn't you have a Fate spinoff for this kind of—allright. Sheesh, and I though Akamatsu-sensei's planning was haphazard. So, we now, briefly I hope, return to Chaldea's headquarters in the snow to find another Saberface silently stalking the corridors…

This was the Saber-san who menaced Ritsuka-sempai and his sister in that other world, the one they'd finally subdued. After that, Sempai's sister turned her into her own Servant; she was much like our Saber-san but even more distant, even colder, even harder to reach, even more humorless, and even more intense. A scary little thing, in other words. Know the worst part? That's not even the scariest version of Saber-san there is out there. We were lucky to get this one, I guess.

Right now, she was sulking to herself, no doubt cranky about Tohsaka-sempai (because who else? What, did you think we'd bother to try and get a new character in place?), I mean, Ishtar-sama's schemes to take them into another world to go run the Half-Naked Deathrace 2000 (has anyone answered poor Nursery Rhyme about which half will be naked?). Maybe because there wouldn't be enough death for her liking. The corrupted Saber-san just couldn't see any point on it. From her point of view, military campaigns were fought and won the traditional bloody way, and in her opinion, this was a farce. As soon as she saw her Master again, she'd have to tell her—

"Ohhhhhh, Artoria-san…!" her Master's voice sang sweetly from behind her, and Saber Alter froze to a halt.

Ooh, how perfect! Go on Sabalter, go ahead and tell her what you were going to tell her!

She looked back. "Master! Since when have you been there!? And what's with that face of yours, isn't it terribly sparkling!?" she took a horrified step back. "Master, you haven't been reading those terrible books again and getting ideas, have you?"

"Eh heh heh, heh heh!" Ritsuko-sempai laughed dumbly. "Never mind that now, Artoria-san. It's not like I'm trying to appeal to you to do anything you don't want to, or anything! I just wanted to see if you'd be willing to come to the Singularity with me, to rescue Oniichan! And your son!"

"I have no son," Saber-san said, proving that she was, indeed, even a worse father than ours. Poor Mo-san, having so many dads and none of them being worth crap. Again, I'm a lucky gal. "As for going there, I will do so if Master commands it, but I fail to see the point of organizing the expedition the way Ishtar wants it done."

Ritsuko shrugged. "Well, she's a goddess of war too, she's gotta know what she's doing, right?"

"Maybe her host body impaired her judgment. I heard that despite all of that student's achievements, she could be quite clumsy and accident prone."

"All the same, Artoria-chan…!" Sempai moaned, making puppy eyes as she placed the tip of her finger on Alter's breastplate and twirled it around, as if trying to drill through and reach the prize underneath. "Nero-chan, Boudicca-chan and others already are in! If they're competing with high spirits, why would you, my favorite Servant, lag behind them this way? Don't you worry that much about your Master…?"

Even though Alter's expression did not change at all, her ahoge stiffened visibly. Yes, I am not making this up. She got a hair erection. Her starkly pale cheeks gained a slight blush. "Y-Your favorite?"

Emotionally manipulative little bitch, isn't she? Wow, are we sure Ritsuka-sempai isn't adopted?

"Mmmmm-hmmmm," Ritsuko nodded, trailing the finger up Alter's neck, tickling the exposed chin, then reaching up to caress the upright and throbbing ahoge. "So I want you to run with all of your black heart put into it, and become Number One for your Ritsuko-chan…"

And now she's fondling the hair erection. Please let this scene end before it cums hairgel or something!

"I am nothing but a tool of my Master's will," Alter said, with eerily unblinking wide eyes. Her ahoge, on the otherhand, throbbed with every stroke "If that is your wish, I will concede it as if I were a Grail myself. Wait with your expectations held high, Master. I will appear before you in a new class, and then dominate this Ishtar Cup, and reign as the strongest—"

"Maid?" Ritsuko suggested.

Alter blinked. "Pardon?"

Sempai nodded. "I was thinking, I'd really like to see you racing around in a black bikini maid ensemble. You would lose pieces of this Meido outfit with every Ascension through the race, until you finally make it to the end in this two-piece that contrasts so beautifully against your white skin…!" Sempai had started panting roughly, her eyes burning, and her mouth well open and drooling. "This is a fantasy of mine that I didn't know I had before, but now it must be sated, and only you can help me, Artoria-chaaaaaaaan!"

Alter paused in shock, tried to understand the Lovecraftian mental turns needed to achieve that kind of train of logic, utterly failed at that, and ended up simply nodding her defeat. "Of course, I will be the Domestic Aide of the Beach Race for you, Master."

"Oh, that's so nice of you, see you at the Leyshift, then!" Sempai smiled, easily spinning around on her heels and impishly skipping away to go net the next sucker.

Alter just stood there, with her black pulsating heart going Doki-Doki as it pumped all sorts of obscene corrupted fluids through her body. Thankfully her ahoge did not spurt slimy fluid of any sort. Then she did something she almost never did and allowed herself a nasty, crooked grin. "I'm going to fuck you so raw, Master," she swore.

In all honesty, it'd be the other way around and she probably already knew it, but hey, whatever worked for her, right? So, can we move on already, then? I already did what you asked and gave you your damned Fate Grand Order! Thank you, that's so nice from you…

* * *

Now Karin-san, Evangeline, Chachamaru, Nao-san, Lala, her sisters, Rito-sempai and Chachazero all sat on a building's conveniently deserted rooftop, the crowd below mostly cleared away before any teachers had made it to the scene. Yeah, you better run, you delinquents! "Well? What's your actual deal then, 'Karin-san'?" Nao coldly asked.

"Let's forget about that for now!" an unamused Rito protested. "Will you please pay attention to us already? Everyone in this campus might be in deadly danger!"

Yes, that much estrogen in the area and _he_ manages to be the girl. Come on Paru, pick better!

"I'm in favor of any topic that strays far away from my relationship with this woman," Eva said bitterly, resting her elbow on a knee, and her chin on a fist. "So speak, then! What has you throwing a scaredy fit this time? You saw another girl's panties, or was she going commando this time?"

Lala spoke before anyone else could. "Oh, it's no big deal, actually! I'm sure Rito and the others are just exaggerating! It seems there's this Joker fellow who crossed paths with you at Kyoto, and he's here now with a bloody revenge against you and fish, but I'm sure we can handle him easily! It's not like he's Bolphunga the Unrelenting, or Bojack the Space Pillager, or Lobo...!"

Nao's face became a mask of white shock. "The Joker?! The actual, flesh and blood, American Joker?!" Everyone knew the British variety of Joker was harmless, the Italian one was a crappy mobster, and the Filipino Joker… well, no one talked about the Filipino. Some things even the Joker found too disgusting, after all.

Rito nodded with great sorrow.

Nao threw her hands up. "Fine, thanks for the heads-up. Now I'm grabbing Mikan and leaving town. Let's call Aunt and ask her if she's got an extra room in Paris, I'm sure she'll understand..."

"Th-that sounds like a great idea, actually," Rito sighed, starting to pull his cellphone out while the Deviluke sisters rolled their eyes. Why were Earthlings so scared of people who had never even blown a single planet on their own? As for Karin, she only sat back, paying attention and learning, while often exchanging steely glares with an ever-watchful Chachamaru. Sitting between them, Evangeline rubbed her forehead and groaned. "Let's see if Morisato-sempai has any sort of update..."

When he made the call, however, a voice that definitely wasn't Keiichi-sempai's spoke to him. The voice was sweet as honey, soothing and very likable, and Rito-sempai felt that kind of pleasant tingling that starts strong in your heart and quickly goes down into your pants. If he'd had an ahoge, it would have been upright and throbbing, and possibly dripping hairgel. "So-rry!" the voice sang happily, "But I'm afraid you'll have to settle for Temptress-chan's Update instead! Yuuki-sempai, right? Nice to meet you at last, I'm a friend of Paru!"

"A friend of... Haruna-chan...?" Sempai babbled, blushing in a way that caught the girls' attenion. "Temptress, you say... Temptress... Temptress!" he finally gasped in remembrance of the stories he'd heard about the Kyoto trip. "You mean, you're that girl who was with-!"

"Aaaa-yeeeep!" the voice giggled coquettishly. "Did you like what we did at that low rent aquarium? Don't be mad, Sempai, that was just a harmless widdle prank! Temptress-chan would never hurt you and ruin your fun, so in return I hope you won't spoil ours either!"

"Give me that phone!" Evangeline demanded

Sempai didn't listen to her at all, seemingly hypnotized and glassy-eyed now, so Eva took the phone away from him with a violent pull and disgusted snarl. Placing it on her ear, she clearly heard a voice that was strangely familiar saying, "I've got your communications all bugged! I'm the Adorable Mistress of all Magi Links and Techno Links! No matter what you do, I'll always be one step ahead of you, so listen and play the game nice, will you?"

"Screw you, and screw your game!" Eva growled. "We're busy with actually important things right now you bimbo!"

"Oh, but if it isn't Eva-chan...!" Temptress' voice laughed, even more playful now. "This gets better and better! Ne, ne, can you get me Negi-kun on the line, please? I've missed hearing his voice, it feels like it's been years...!"

"I'm all you'll get, slut," Eva huffed. "Now, if you don't have anything relevant to say-"

"Not a word of this to Gramps Cucumber Head, that's all I'm asking!" Temptress cutely asked, never breaking character. Whoever she was, she was good! Chew on that, Natsumi! "Well, not to him, and not to any of his boring, poo-faced meanies either. I mean, they'd cancel this lovely Carnival we've got going here! Where would we get our happy youth memories then?"

Eva sneered. "Are you fucking kidding me?-! You bring your murder clown posse here and you expect Boya and the others to stand aside, letting you do whatever you want? Do you really think they'll ever do that? They're too stupid to do anything but try to stop you!"

"Oh, they're welcome to find us if they can, all I want is to keep Gramps and Company out of our private affairs..." Temptress made a cutesy spoiled sound over the line. "Adults, they ruin all the fun when they start meddling around, being an eternal child, you should know, right, Eva-chan? So here's what we'll do. You do whatever you want, keep playing around and wait for our surprises, I'm sure you'll love them as much as you love me, or come after us yourselves and get us, especially get me, hmmmm yessss, especially Negi-kun... That's pretty much all there's to this, rules-wise!" Eva could swear she almost saw her shrug through the line. "Games with a lot of rules and boring, so let's keep it loose! Well, gotta go, don't worry about telling the others, I'll contact them myself! Bye-bye, and kisses!" she actually blew Eva an audible kiss before the call went dead.

Evangeline lowered the phone with an expression of scorn that couldm't help pleasing Karin. "Master?" Chachamaru warily asked. "I think I caught on most of your conversation through my sensors, but-"

"I hate," Evangeline decided, "smart-ass older-than-they-look loli femme fatales who toy around with others while flaunting their pretended sex appeal around!"

There was a short silence all over the rooftop then.

"Don't we all?" Nana finally asked, genuinely confused.

Momo punched her in an arm. "You certainly don't while in bed, you...!"

* * *

"Well," Skuld mumbled, lowering her cellphone down, "now I can say that's the second most unpleasant person I've ever talked to."

Somewhere, in Chaldea, Urd-sama sneezed. "Why am I Number One?!" she suddenly screamed, while Da Vinci-sensei and Roman-sensei gave Ishar confused looks. Ishtar only smirked and shrugged.

"Wh-What did she say?" asked Morisato-sempai. The two of them sat, with Natsumi and Mikan-chan, on a bench outside of the aquarium, ignored by the passerbys absorbed into their own personal affairs. The call had been made only moments ago, shortly after they'd left to wait for more news from Lala, Rito, or any of the others, and ever since it'd started, Skuld's face hadn't ever stopped shifting from one very amusing wild expression to another. I wish someone back then had the presence of mind to take pictures so I could see them myself, I really do!

Skuld sighed. "She implied, while never stopping flirting with me, they'd launch a full strike at the whole campus as soon as we attempted a mass evacuation or contacted the Headmaster's office. Basically, looks like we're in this on our own."

"Do you really think they can do something like that?" Natsumi asked critically, still unsure if she should believe anything of what they were telling her. So far they had supplied no solid proof, and while she'd always had a few suspicions, in hindsight they looked so ridiculous now...

"You don't know anything about Servants," Skuld told her, always a social butterfly. "Even the weakest Heroic Spirits have several ways to massacre hundreds of not thousands of human beings at once, especially given time to prepare themselves. Even if Temptress happens to be a funny looking chump for Servant standards, she's still not to be understimated..."

"Then don't!" suddenly shouted a squeaky, angry-cutesy voice from Skuld's phone as it turned itself back on. "I still can listen to you, you know!"

Skuld hissed, turned it off again, placed several rune covered sticker wards on it, threw it into her bag, and zipped the bag up in a single furious yank. It's not easy rooming up with someone with that much pent-up frustration. "Anyway! See? That little creep's a master of electronic surveillance, and somehow, she knows most of our secrets, while we know nothing about her! We must learn her identity to lfind her weaknesses out!"

"Let's see..." Morisato-sempai hummed, rubbing his chin. "That's weird, I was under the impression most Servants came from times where they just couldn't have mastered any electronics? And a Loli, really? That just makes it even more confusing!"

Skuld sighed. "Let's keep in mind she can be someone you used to think of as male. That happens through history more often than you'd think. Also, while Heroic Spirits do come mostly from your distant past, there are exceptions. The Throne of Heroes is timeless, after all, and in several future timelines, mankind regressed enough today's public figures have become nebulous legends themselves..."

Natsumi, quite understandably, grimaced. "Is this why Chisame-san is so weirded out while hanging around you?"

"Pretty much," Mikan-chan quietly confirmed, slowly chewing on some teriyaki. It felt like she lacked the right person to share it with, though, which made her feel strangely bad.

"Wow," Natsumi said. "My sympathy for her has skyrocketed. Anyway, let me see if I got this right. The Joker was one of the guys who wanted to kidnap Konoka-san back at Kyoto, but you didn't let him, so he's out to get all of us now, with the help of this girl who is a ghost given a new life, and Saber-san is one of those ghosts too?"

"Eh, more or less," Skuld grunted.

"There's also another ghost in your class, but she's the real type of ghost, from what I've heard," Mikan-chan pointed out. "I haven't met her myself yet, but Negi-sensei says-"

"Oh, that's the first girl in the roster, right?" Natsumi deduced. "Aisaka Sayo? That's an easy one, I always wondered why they just didn't take her off the list already. Ah, that means the teachers all do know about this kind of things, don't they?"

"Only some of them," Skuld warned, "and remember, if those learn Negi's secrets have been making the rounds even more than usual, they'll turn him into an ermine! You don't want that in your conscience, do you?"

Theater Girl huffed. "I'd never do anything to hurt Negi-sensei at all! If he lied to me, keeping me in the dark while sharing his precious secrets with pretty much everyone else under the sun, I'm sure he had his perfectly good and valid reasons!"

Mikan-chan blinked. "Wow. I'l never call Nana-san passive agressive again..."

Natsumi stared at Skuld. "By the way, have you also stressed the importance of that to Haruna, and Asakura-san, and Yuuna-san, and Makie-san, and Yuuki-sempai, and Misora, and Emiya-sempai, and Asuna-san, and Konoka-san, and Misa-san, and-"

Hey! At the very least, _I_ am as trustworthy as they come!

"They all know it very well, and several have been threatened on the consequences as well!" Skuld said. "It may not look like it to you, who have no proper context to judge us, but we all care very much about not giving away any of our valuable secrets!"

"You're discussing this by pretty much yelling it out in the open," Morisato-sempai reminded her.

"You stay out of this!" Natsumi and Skuld snapped at him at once.

He, to his credit, did not back away yet. "I was just wondering, maybe you'd like it if I brought you some nice megaphons, maybe whip out a few banners for everyone to see, obviously we aren't being secretive enough yet... Sorry, please don't kill me just yet," he grunted, pulling his own phone out as it rang. "Hello? Oh... Oh, it's you, Megumi. No, no, I'm just actually glad it's you, we've been getting some... wrong calls lately, and... Huh? Yeah, well, communications are a bit screwy today, it's, uh, a side effect of all the attractions, you know, they release lots of electromagnetism all around the campus. No, I'm not mocking you! Sheesh, are you okay? Ah-hah. Fine. That's good. Geez, they did what? Megumi, I told you, picking cosplayers up around here isn't safe, this isn't Nekomi and... I? W-Well, I'm by the riverbank aquarium with Sku-chan and a couple friends, but I don't think- Megumi! Megumi, geez, just listen, will-!"

He lowered it again with a growl in frustration, then looked at Mikan-chan. "Your big brother is lucky he is **your** big brother!"

Mikan-chan shrugged. "Please tell me something I didn't already know?"

Sempai then looked at the others. "My sister's coming here with three of my Sempais from Nekomi and two alleged 'sexy fashionable pirate cosplayers', which for all I know are burly men in drag. I won't call her back to tell her not to come since I want to keep an eye on her, but I'll understand if any of you wants to-"

"Pirates?" Skuld blinked.

Sempai nodded. "Yeah, that's what I said. So what?"

Skuld hummed lowly. "I'm not sure. But somehow, I've got a kind of weird feeling about that part, all of a sudden..."

Natsumi huffed, looking aside. "Well, after ghosts, robots, a vampire, aliens, ninja, mages, a goddess, someone who is half a demon, Sailor V, several shotacons, someone with wings, an old man chaser, and a stalker from 3-F, I guess we still were short on pirates, weren't we?"

"She's not Sailor V, that's one of her friends," Skuld lamely offered. "She's Sailor Mercury..."

"I think I'll get those megaphons and banners before Megumi makes it here," Sempai decided, actually standing up.

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **Omake! Meet the Crew of Chaldea, in the event you aren't already sick of them!**

 **Fujimaru Ritsuka:** An ordinary, average, plain and unremarkable Japanese high school student from another, doomed dimension. So normal Hitou Nami would look strange as fuck next to him, which further proves he's not of this world. Months ago, Ritsuka and his twin sister Ritsuko were donating blood when the secret Chaldea organization, the magical arm of the United Nations, found incredibly high levels of compatibility with Heroic Spirits in their systems… somehow. The Fujimarus were chased to their house by a recruiting agent of Chaldea, who after being whacked several times over the head with a baseball bat by Ritsuko, told a bullshit a story about wanting to hire the siblings for a summer job. After that failed, he threw in an absurdly 'get-rich-quick' amount of money.

After arriving at the Chaldea complex, Ritsuka and Ritsuko learned they actually were to be part of a selected team of magi picked to save all of human existence from complete annihilation. Ritsuka reacted apathetically, having hoped for a simple job to pay a few bills and debts, and thus made as little effort to go through the magical training as possible. However, when tragedy struck and the siblings were left as the only living magi in Chaldea, Ritsuka grew serious and swore to do his best to save the world. He's laughably inept as a magus because see making no effort to learn whatsoever, and he's abysmally bad as a fighter to boot, but he shows an amazing ability to somehow command Servants and gain their trust even though there's no real reason why they should follow him at all except 'well, he's nice and kind of handsome'. So, yeah, he's basically the ultimate average nobody braindead shounen harem manga protagonist. Now you all know why we like his sister better. Since arriving in this world, he's quickly found a friend and platonic soulmate in Shirou, although he hates how all the locals have taken to call him a low rent, counterfeit Emiya. The fact Emiya himself doesn't outright contradict these accusations whenever they are uttered further frustrates the normally affable Ritsuka.

 **Saber (Mordred Le Fay/Pendragon)** : The 'son' of Artoria Pendragon, and Ritsuka's Servant and first Ministra. Conceived by Artoria's twisted half-sister Morgan Le Fay after Merlin briefly endowed Artoria with a male member so she and Queen Guinevere could procreate (that's his story and he's sticking to it. It's most certainly not because she was drunk and he thought it would be funny). Instead, Morgan used her magical arts to disguise herself as Guinevere and, um, well, you know. Morgan grew to an accelerated rate as a homunculus forged within Morgan's womb, and was sent to infiltrate Artoria's ranks as a knight. At first dejecting her mother's cause and loyally serving her lord, she was embittered when Artoria rejected her as a successor to the throne, turning against her until they killed each other. No one believing her when she tried to prove that Mysterious Heroine X was really the king had something to do with it.

Now reborn as a Heroic Spirit, Mordred is fiercely loyal to Ritsuka, who earned her respect during the Londinium campaign (somehow. Despite not really doing anything worth that kind of respect. See previously, ultimate average nobody braindead shounen harem manga protagonist), ever if she denies respecting him vehemently. Their Pactio doesn't lend her any extra special skills other than a relatively minor compatibility and power boost, since Ritsuka is abysmal as a magus and far worse than Shirou, but for Chaldea's Servants, Pactios aren't about extra might, but about bragging rights with their Master. She has a complicated relationship both with her own gender identity and with her 'father'.

 **Rider (Marie Antoinette Hapsburg)** : A former queen of France, and Ritsuka's Servant and second Ministra. Born an Austrian, Marie was engaged to young French king Louis XVI, both falling quickly in love and siring children. However, when the French Revolution struck, almost all of the royal family lost their lives, and Marie herself was beheaded at the guillotine. Despite her tragedy, Marie remains a bubbly, happy-go-lucky adorable young woman who intensely loves everyone, even her enemies. And her executioner. She favors her Master over all, however, fancying him her new husband.

Marie has the skill to make everyone but the most hardened and perverse love her in return, which spares her from the wrath most of her romantic rivals would usually have no problem unleashing on others. She also loves pastries.

 **Shielder (Mashu Kyrielight)** : A young, test tube conceived artificial human and employee of Chaldea, which is breaking all sort of child labor laws; Ritsuka's first Servant and third Pactio partner. Currently sixteen, she is expected to die before she's eighteen, a fact only known by herself, Doctor Roman, Leonardo Da Vinci, Mordred, Sir Gawain, Ritsuka, Ritsuko and the Cursed-Arm Assassin (so, yeah, not all that secret). Despite her ordeal, Mashu remains spirited and has sworn to devote her life to Ritsuka, who saved her from certain death during the Fuyuki Singularity.

Bonded during infancy with the Heroic Spirit of Sir Galahad, she had gained control over Lord Camelot, Artoria's favorite lunch table which she has turned into an unbeatable shield. Artoria lets her keep it since she has no use for it anymore, now, if she only could catch the bastard who stole her actual precious shield already…

* * *

 **Omake! Learning with Unequally Rational and Emotional!**

"Well, if you're that worried about them," Chisame finally told Ritsuka, "why don't you burn those troublesome Servants?"

Ritsuka blinked. "Burn Tamamo and Kiyohime?"

"Why, yes, Sempai!" Mashu said. "Haven't you played FGO? Didn't you pay attention to the tutorials? Haven't you read Riyo's manga? You can burn Servants at Da Vinci's shop to free some space or, in this case, rid yourself of life threatening Yandere..."

Mordred nodded energetically. "Yeah, that's a good idea! You could feed me some Four Star Experience Cards to eat from the Mana Prism Exchange! And seen the jackal is a gold, you get Rare Prisms too!"

Ritsuka rubbed his chin. "Hmm, just as expected, Mo-san is an expert when it comes to her food..." Here Artoria's chest puffed up with pride. "But Da Vinci isn't here, so where...?"

Shirou laughed weakly. "Ah-ha-ha, well, I'm not sure it's the same thing, but maybe you could ask the supervisor of our War here..."

Ritsuka's face lit up. "Seriously?! Well, then let's go and burn them!" 

* * *

"Sold!" Ritsuka grinned, now holding a big box full of shiny materials in his hands. "Now I'm full of Prisms and QP, whoo-hoo!"

"You didn't have to sell everybody else in the party as well, Master," Marie said while Mordred, Artoria, Mashu, Chisame, Matoi and Shirou facepalmed.

"Sorry, I got carried away," Fujimaru said. "I should remember to lock my cards next time…"

"Congratulations, young man. Now what do you want in exchange?" asked the tall, dark and handsome priest standing before them in the Mary Magdalene Mahora Church. "I suggest some stylish and always useful Black Keys..."

"Don't spook us, Kirei," Shirou grumbled. "Don't listen to him, Fujimaru! Those toys don't work, even after he makes you pay so much for them!"

Ritsuka smiled and said, without a doubt, "I want all the Summon Tickets you can buy with these, please!"

The scream when he got Kiyohime and Tamamo back in his next two rolls broke the windows.

Kirei was very pleased.

* * *

 **Omake!** **Martha's Pop Quiz of Salvation!**

Greetings. Servant Ruler, humble Servant of the Holy Cause and friend to you and all other fair men and women, here to bring you something that could greatly help the wellbeing of your immortal soul. After partaking in the often immoral and scandalous adventures and misadventures of Professor Negi, Mister Emiya and his companions, please cleanse your spirit. Take only a few moments to gaze into yourself, ponder what have you done with your life, and honestly answer these easy to understand questions we have compiled for you.

OR ELSE I'LL PUNCH YOUR PUNK ASSES INTO THE LAKE OF FIRE, SINNERS! I'M SERIOUS HERE, I'M DOING THIS FOR YOUR OWN GOOD, YOU HORNY GEEKS!

Ahem. I'm sorry! I just wanted to make sure you were paying attention!

 _Question One: Do you think you are doing your best to carry out Our Lord's will?_

1- Of course I do! It is what I live for!

2- I'm not sure, I guess I can be kind of fickle at times, and it's not like I go to Church every Sunday or anything, but I try my best to be a good Christian...

3- I don't believe in God as a supreme omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent entity since the existence of such a being is incompatible with the state of mankind and existence as a while. Were that kind of flawless, all powerful creature with nothing but our best interests to exist, we would live in a world with a complete absence of evil and decay.

4- What? You are already grilling me? From the start, are you implying I'm some sort of bad person who doesn't care to do whatever God wants me to? Are you saying I'm some sort of evil instead? I'm a good person, I don't deserve this treatment!

5- Of course not! I'm fucking evil! Go scram, charlatan!

 _Question Two: Do you love your neighbor just like you love yourself, or moreso?_

1- Of course I do! That's in the Scriptures, and my heart is filled with nothing but love for all my brothers and sisters, children of the Almighty!

2- Gee, well, it's not like I'm one to hold grudges, and I'll always try being nice and polite and respectful to everyone. As long as they don't go out of their way to harm me or my loved ones, sure, I guess I do love them, although 'love' is such a strong word...!

3- I hold nothing but respect for my peers, but I also believe love is to be focused strictly on those the emotionally closest to you, and pretending otherwise is foolish and cheapens the emotions involved in the subject.

4- I'm not in love with anyone yet! Don't be an idiot, don't throw those terms around so lightly! Besides, my neighbors are either annoying or forgettable! You want me start loving them? Okay, what if they start loving me by giving me my own space and stop messing around me? That's just fair, don't you think? Aren't you all about being fair, huh huh? If I love those who do nasty things like screwing around with my otherwise peaceful life, then I'm cheering for their twisted ways, is that what you're telling me to do?!

5- Of course not! I only love myself, you idiot!

 _Question Three: When slapped, will you turn the other cheek?_

1- Of course I will! It hurts a lot, but I'm sure I will be rewarded eventually and my offender will eventually see the error of their ways!

2- Now, let's be realistic here, there must be a healthy limit to everything. As long as that person is only hurting me and I can take it, sure, I'll do so, but once that person crosses the line and starts harming my loved ones, I'd say the time to being forgiving is gone and the time to kick butt is here!

3- I believe in self defense as a prerogative of every living creature. If that person who struck me has no solid reasoning behind their course of action, I will retaliate immediately to prevent more such incidents from taking place in the future.

4- ... this isn't some sort of weird spanking trick question, is it? I don't want to think you of all people would come up with one of those!

5- Of course not! Moron, no one gets to slap me even once! I'll have their hand ripped off before they can!

 _Question Four: Would you kiss someone out of your age group on the lips, out of marriage, just for the sake of a mere reward in terms of power and influence?_

1- O-Of course not! That would be scandalous and dirty!

2- W-W-Well, it depends on the circumstances; normally, I'd never do that, of course, but if the power is to be used for the greater good and there is no other way to obtain it, doesn't that amoral act actually become the most moral thing to do?

3- I can be trusted with any sort of power, being as I am a rational personal completely in control of my own impulses and dominated by nothing but empiric logic. Thusly, a trivial thing like a fleeting kiss is no big price to pay for power like the one you seem to be implying with your question.

4- You are setting me up! You can't prove anything before any court of law! And I'd do pretty much anything to survive, that's the most basic of my rights, but I wouldn't do filthy things at all otherwise, okay?!

5- Of course I would, except because I don't need stooping myself like that to gain further power. If anything, others should try leeching power from my magnificence! Care for a demostration?

 _Question Five: How many times have you been naked before others, out of the bath, over the last week?_

1- Not a single time, dear goodness!

2- It was an accident, okay? It could've happened to anyone! There were no lustful intentions behind that!

3- Nudity is a simple natural state of the human body and doesn't necessarily imply simultaneous performance of lascivious acts. The deep seated taboos and stigmas concerning otherwise innocent aspects of human nature and behavior have only actually deepened the gulf of troubling sexual behavior by throwing a dark shadow over things that should come off as simply natural, like our anatomies themselves.

4- Okay, you're just harassing me now! You're the dirty minded one here, Martha! What is it about you and my private life?!

5- I lost the count, I guess? I'm answering this quiz while in the nude, actually.

 _Your Results!_

Most Answers are '1': Nice try, Miss Misora, but while you obviously understand the Law, you clearly don't bother to follow it! Hypocrisy is an even worse sin than flaunting your deviancy openly! The Lord hates duplicity! Get to work harder on your redemption!

Most Answers are '2': Thanks for your time and honesty, Professor Negi. While I can respect the purity and nobility of your intentions, I also remind you going the dark way over self-justified misdeeds is an easy pitfall for those with little life experience, and good intentions have often made demons out of many an angel. Please work harder to keep yourself in the light path! And how do you know about the word 'lustful', anyway?

Most Answers are '3': Hakase-san, the Lord hates the absence of faith, and just because you cannot put something in a test tube and study it, it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The rules you pretend ignoring because they don't fit your preconceived vision of the world are still God's edict, so please start opening your mind to the truth, and you will see it!

Most Answers are '4': Miss Chisame, you are a very troubled young person. Please search for professional help while also praying for enlightment from our Father. Also, we aren't all out to get you, since we do care about you.

Most Answers are '5': ... Lady Evangeline, I'll answer you as soon as I decide whether you're just despicable and a lost cause, or, the most likely since there are no lost causes other than devils, just a very edgy tryhard wannabe. Even so, I'm still not discarding you are an actual demon. Either way, you should meet and talk with Nobunaga-san one of these days.

No Answers were Given: Sloth is one of the Capital Sins, you knew that?!


	9. Date Note

Wow, writing a whole chapter of an ongoing storyline from a first person perspective, especially from someone who wasn't around to personally witness everything, sure is trying. First person perspective is okay for oneshots and the like, but let's not do it again in a thing like this, will we?

("Hey!" Yuuna said. " _I_ did my best, old man! What about you, eh? Ehh?")

* * *

Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha created and own _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ and _UQ Holder: Mahou Sensei Negima Badly Written Electric Boogaloo 2_.

Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon created and own _Fate/Stay Night_ , _Fate EXTRA_ and _Fate Grand Order_.

DC Comics owns Batman, created by Bill Finger and, sort of, Bob Kane.

Coca-Cola created from wine, coffee and cocaine. What did you _think_ the 'coca' meant?

* * *

 **You Broke with Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Nine**.

 **Date Note- or- It's Okay As Long As It's Just Your Cousin And You're Only Holding Hands**.

* * *

"Sorry to keep you waiting! Black Rose Baron!" Negi said, stopping before the enigmatic figure with the groaning invisible selves of Assassin and Ruler hanging behind him, an amused Chamo perched on his scalp.

"Ah, Negi Springfield!" the Black Rose Baron gestured in a fitting melodramatic way. "Glad to see you could pick me up from a whole crowd! I'd expect no less from my sworn rival, however!"

"I'm well aware I may be walking into a trap," Negi declared grandiosely, "but I'm not afraid! Lead the way into the belly of the beast!"

The crowd gathered around the entrance had mostly stopped to look at them in funny ways.

"We're filming a student movie," they both said at once, and the onlookers began walking away muttering.

"So, um," the Baron coughed into a fist, blushing slightly. She extended a delicate hand ahead. "I know it's unbecoming for a male to ask his rival to lead them, hand on hand, into a dat- a trap or duel of wits, but, well, I realize I could easily pass for a foreign woman, which is the sole reason behind this disguise, actually, so..."

"I' suppose I could agree to that. Purely to maintain cover for the sake of any watchers, of course," Negi said, graciously taking their hand and then leading them into the colorful Dinosaur Land (sponsored by InGen, Gentek, Umbrella Corporation, LexCorp, OsCorp and the Latverian Embassy), with the same charm and sophistication he'd have shown had they been marching into a fine ballroom instead of somewhere stuffed of animatronic beasts, crying children suffering from overheat, hot dogs salesmen, and college students protesting the cultural appropriation of the Savage Land.

"This," Ruler turned to Assassin, "is why I never took an interest in romance, young or otherwise. The part about them being cousins doesn't bother me that much, during our time that was common, and we used to have worse age differences, even if the other way around..."

"Likewise for me," the other Heroic Spirit said as they followed Negi in. "But I imagined your conscience would be plagued by the thought we, technically, are entering these premises without paying."

Martha paused. "Oh great, you stupid bumpkin!" she finally cried in anger after a moment of stunned pause. "Now I won't be able to enjoy myself at all!"

Kojiro laughed gently to himself. This young lady, she certainly was fun to push around...

* * *

 _The Haunted House of Cute Insane Girls:_

"Thank you, come back soon and bring more friends along!" Kakizaki Misa friendly waved at the visitors leaving her sexily decorated ancient Egyptian tomb. Wrapped in skimpy bandages that only covered enough to preserve her modesty and make it clear that she was supposed to be a mummy and not a regular bandage-fetishist slut, she sat back on the false golden throne and waited for the next set of visitors, crossing her shapely legs. "Now, who's next in line to face the wrath of the Pharaoh, only to be spared if you pay proper tribute...?"

Akashi Yuuna stormed in, followed by that really popular Tomoe chick, which promptly shot Misa's good humor down. "Ah, you're here at last," the cheerleader said, pulling out a white bedsheet with eye holes and two jackal ears attached to its top. "Good thing you're here, now you can play Medjed-sama as we agreed..."

"Kakizaki!" Yuuna shouted. "This is serious, this is bad, the Joker's here, there's some new kind of Orphan or some shit, and we might have a new haremette around!"

Misa blinked, sighed, pressed a button on the throne's armrest that sealed both doors of the chamber, and rested her chin on her fingers, in the everlasting Ikari Gendo pose. "I'd like to remind you, Akashi, I have actual functional pit traps here, and that Pharaohs were big on the 'kill the messenger' mentality."

"I helped set up those traps," Yuuna reminded her. "And they're filled with inflatable crocodiles to cushion people's fall."

"I still can flood them, I'm the powerful Nitocris, you know!" Misa absently played with another button in the armrest.

Yuuna blinked. "Are you playing a Queen, or a James Bond villain? Anyway, I've just seen evidence of the Joker tampering with the fish exhibitions! Then we couldn't call you through the phone or the cards, so I had to run here, but along the way I saw some Orphans kidnapping Tomoe-san away! In broad daylight!"

"Hi!" Mami smiled, waving at Misa. "I like your haunted house a lot, shame we had to go in through the back instead of taking the proper tour!"

Misa glared blandly at her, then gave her a half-baked wave of a hand back. "So, instead of making excuses for this girl, you brought her and apparently spilled the whole beans to her along the way. What have we ever done to you, Yuuna?"

"Give me a break," Yuuna protested, "I'm in the middle of an emergency and I can't just mindwipe people with magic, what am I supposed to do, stage this elaborate hoax and showing her the proof of the movie we were filming while in a life or death hurry? I was coming here to see if you still were alive, ingrate!"

"Thank you," Misa sighed. "But still! It doesn't take a lot to trick people away from the track, you should've studied the guide Negi-kun prepared like the rest of us! Now odds are I'll have to throw this girl into one of the flooding pits!"

"Please don't talk about me as if I weren't here," Mami politely requested. "Also, I think you're telling me more of your strange secrets through your rant than Akashi-san did while bringing me here."

Misa rubbed her temples. "Couldn't you have left her outside, just telling her to wait there for a logical explanation, since you couldn't think of one?"

"You're still doing it," Mami pointed out.

"The monsters had clearly picked her for kidnapping for some reason, do you think they wouldn't have sent more for her if I'd left her alone?!" Yuuna said. "Look, if you aren't going to be of any help just take me to Iinchou already!"

"Oh, I'll do it anyway, she's the highest ranked member around with no Chisame or Haruka-sempai," Misa replied, rising from her throne. "Let her figure out what to do with you."

Mami cracked a little smile. "Oh my, does she wield a higher authority than that of the Pharaoh?"

"Heh, cute, but we all know Iinchous always trump Pharaohs," Misa half smirked. "Now be a good girl and don't ask any more questions until it's her turn to answer them..."

* * *

Chisame, Matoi, Illya, Berserker, Sayoko, Shirou, Artoria, Fujimaru and his three Ministra Servants stood on the roof of the junior high female dorm, a building that was deserted at the time, making it easy, for once, to get both boys in; the massive Servant had been no problem at all thanks to his Spirit form, of course. Now Berserker sat on the ledge, mutely staring into the distance while his muscular legs quietly swung back and forth.

Shirou stared at him curiously. "What?" Illya grunted at him, after getting fed up with his silent bewilderment.

"Um, nothing!" the redhead said. "It's nice to see him so quiet for once, but I still can't get used to it..."

"I can tell him to stop relaxing as easily as I told him to take it easy, if you like him better that way," Illya curtly told him.

"Sempai, stop provoking her, we've got enough problems at it is," Chisame chided while Matoi and Artoria nodded, and Shirou blinked, wondering why he was at fault now. "Okay, Fujimura-sempai, stop stalling and summon those girls here at once. Don't be a chicken, if they try anything, you've got three loyal Servants and Berserker won't miss a chance to start making people go splash, right?"

"Splash?" Shirou said.

"Splash," Chisame repeated, miming a water balloon exploding. "Blood everywhere. Splash."

"... I don't want them to go splash, either!" Ritsuka protested.

Mordred shrugged. "I won't shed any tears for them. Why don't we just burn them? You could feed me some Four Star Experience Cards to eat from the Mana Prism Exchange! And since the jackal is a gold, you get Rare Prisms too!"

"Mordred, what happened in the omake stays in the omake," her father coldly chastised her.

Ritsuka sighed and closed his eyes, raising his fist, a Command Seal flaring on his skin. "Okay, come forth... Lancer!"

Immediately, in a flash of white light, a tall, very shapely and sexy woman in a small purple bikini with a flower pattern appeared before them, holding a long spear over her shoulder, and sipping from a big glass of tropical juice held in the opposite hand. Several bags stuffed with souvenirs hung from the end of the spear like she was some kind of fashionable hobo.

This long haired, extremely gorgeous and mysterious looking woman blinked slowly at the sight of Fujimaru, even as Berserker tensed and growled, only held back by a silent gesture of Illyasviel. "Oh, Master," she said, with a casual lift of a thin eyebrow. "Such a relief, seeing you again, on your feet and healthy. I was tearing these grounds apart, looking for you."

"... looks like you were just enjoying the Festival to me, Scathach-san," Mashu dared to disagree, with a none too amused expression.

Mordred gasped. "Wait, what?! What kind of copout is this?! We didn't come along with this witch!"

Marie blinked at her. "Monsieur Mo, don't you remember? She came with us eight chapters ago!"

 _Leonardo nodded, tapping on her e-notepad with a pen as the faces of several Servants showed in the large screens set around the chamber while she named them. "For support, Mashu, Karna, Kiyohime, Diarmuid, Anne and Mary, Fionn, Mordred, Teach, Tamamo-san, Beowulf, Scathach, Sasaki and Marie Antoinette will act as your designated Servants..."_

"Ah, that's right," Mordred grunted. "Can't blame a guy for forgetting, too many people in this damned operation! And it's not like she got any scenes in the meanwhile either!"

Ignoring this exchange with noticeable equanimity, the newcomer gazed over those present she didn't know from before. "I assume you have already established the usual alliances with friendly locals, Master? I only hope that doesn't mean you have spent all of your time socializing or unconscious, as being too long apart from the heat of battle dulls a warrior's soul."

"Again, respectfully I must tell you, looks like you were taking an extended break from battle yourself, Miss Scathach," Mashu said.

"I was not. You should have seen those lines at the souvenir shops, they were murder."

"I can vouch for that, they always are," Chisame said before stepping ahead. "Ahem. What the hell, I guess I have to do this, as I'm the most senior member here. Look, I'm Hasegawa Chisame from Ala Alba, you could say we are the unofficial troubleshooters for the weird and bothersome around here, so your Master asked us for our help. These are Emiya Shirou and Illyasviel von Einzbern, two resident Masters, and they're in a truce of sorts with us at the time, too. Their Servants are this Saber and that Berserker, respectively..."

"I see," Lancer quietly stared at the uneasy, huffing Berserker. "You have summoned a peerless but also very demanding champion, child," she warned Illya.

The small albino smiled haughtily. "I'm more than up to the task of being Berserker's Master! Your Master, on the other hand, won't even have the courage to summon his Berserker already!"

Lancer looked at Ritsuka again. "What have you done to invoke Kiyohime's wrath this time, Master?"

"How did you know she wasn't talking about-" Fujimaru deflated with a sigh. "Listen, I kissed Mashu, Mordred and Marie-san, but only because I had to, okay?! Please help me so I don't get killed before I get a chance to explain myself!"

"Ah," Lancer said. "Master, I am a woman who can achieve the impossible, never backing away from any challenge no matter the odds, and thus was elevated to the equal of a Divine Spirit in life, immortal and undying. You know that, and also that my loyalty to you knows no bounds." She took another, loud sip from her drink. "That being said, you're on your own on this one, buddy. Those bitches be crazy. I suggest you immediately burn Kiyohime and Tamamo away and trade them for Prisms and Cards."

"See, see!" Mordred said vehemently.

Ritsuka slammed a foot down. "Dammit, Lancer, you too?!"

Then Lancer out of the blue said, "By the way, is that person an Assassin, or is he just on his way to becoming one?"

Ritsuka blinked. "What person- Ah!" this latest, gasped part of the line was shared by Chisame, Matoi, Illya, Shirou, Mashu, Mordred and Marie. Artoria only rolled her eyes in shame at her son's n00bness, and Berserker quietly slammed his slab on the open palm of his hand, growling to himself like an expecting beast.

Sayoko blinked, putting a hand to her cheek. "Ah, do you mean you hadn't noticed him?"

The Batman was standing right behind Matoi, taking a diminutive bat shaped black speck, its metal shining under the sun, from the back of Matoi's collar. "Scarecrow's not at home," he dryly told Chisame, "but it's him, alright. There's no mistaking his choices of Literature. Where's your teacher?"

"Gyah!" Matoi recoiled from him. "You were here?!"

He nodded stoically. "Yes, always. Or at least, long enough to be introduced to Scathach, the Witch from the Land of Shadows of the Connatch myth, teacher of Cu Chulainn the Hound of Ulster." He paused, then laconically added, "I'm Batman."

Chisame blinked. "Oh! You mean she's the teacher to that guy in the blue-?!"

"Hm," Shirou rasped uneasily, interrupting her, "Batman-sama, right? The real Batman-sama, not that pretender who used to run around in sharp armor, correct? It's a pleasure, Sir, I've been a longtime fan, I'm Emiya Shirou, Negi-sensei has told me a lot about you..."

"Adopted son of Emiya Kiritsugu, Magus Killer," Batman icily said, without looking at the boy. "I fought him twice. A very misguided man. I'd hoped you'd stay away from his path."

Shirou's eyes shone while his Saber facepalmed. "You knew my Father...?!" he gushed.

"He's Batman, he knows everyone!" Chisame wearily sighed. "Listen, I'm sure he's about to-"

Batman raised a pointer finger, then identified everyone else present he hadn't met previously. "Heracles, the granddaughter of that Einzbern bastard, Queen Marie Antoinette, Mordred the Knight of Treachery, Genderbent Sir Galahad, King Arthur, the former maid for two of the heirs to the British crown, and you... well, I have no idea who are you supposed to be," he finally told Ritsuka.

"Yep, he definitely knows Grandfather, alright," Illya nodded.

"Yay, I'm completely unremarkable," Ritsuka blandly cheered.

"Does EVERYONE know who I am?" Arturia said, sounding a bit peeved.

"To be honest, I wouldn't have recognized her either if not for the table," Batman admitted, pointing at Shielder.

"It's a shield!" protested the young woman.

Matoi rubbed the back of her neck uneasily. "Batman-sama, why did you place your bug on me of all people?"

"Your attention always was focused on the boy teacher and her," Batman gestured towards Chisame, "so there would have been no way to tag them. You, on the other hand, leave yourself too open while looking after others."

"Oh," Matoi said. "Well, you know me, I am of no importance compared to Chisame-sama and Negi-sama!"

"So tell me, then," the Bat snarled. "Where is HE right now? I won't repeat myself a third time."

Lancer looked at Artoria, whom she figured was the sanest person around. At least this one wasn't wearing a black mask, Santa Claus cosplay, or humongous breast implants. "Is this another local unofficial law enforcer?"

"The most feared they have, from what I gather," Artoria answered. "Where did you buy that juice, Lancer? It looks simply delicious..."

Yup, definitely an Artoria.

* * *

As they walked along the crowded streets, Narutaki Fuuka asked the male Sempai of the twins' roommate, "Ne, ne, Naruto-sempai, I heard you've traveled a lot, haven't you?"

"Hmm? Yeah, I guess I have..." Uzumaki Naruto mused, scratching the tip of his nose for a moment. "But then again, most of that time's been spent on training trips and, uh, errands, so it's not like I ever got to enjoy lots of cool places like this before..."

"That, and Naruto usually got us shooed out of wherever we went," Haruno Sakura reminisced. "They'd always end up saying 'damn, stop making us bad, stupid Gary Stu!' as they'd chase us out with pitchforks and torches."

Naruto frowned. "You forgot the part where they'd also run after Sasuke telling him to stay away from their women."

"So what?" the pink haired Sempai argued. "It's not like he ever took advantage of them! He couldn't help being attractive!"

"It's just," Hyuuga Hinata commented for the Narutakis' benefit with a soft blessed smile, "Naruto-kun is so competent at what he does, others couldn't help feeling lessened around him..."

"Damn straight!" Naruto grinned.

"It's more like he has this aura that, wherever we go, well, as long as we're fighting in Konoha or close to it, everything seems to go okay, alright, but as soon as we go... I don't know, far enough away, and we meet really different people from different cultures and societies, it's like bam, they start acting dumber so Naruto could look better! It's perplexing, that's like the best superpower he has!"

"Well, it's worked in our favor too, so why are you complaining?" Naruto mumbled, arms folded.

"I'm not complaining too much, I'm just saying it's kind of creepy! I actually fear for these poor people now we're here! Given how dumb you are, we might be giving them permanent brain damage to make them even dumber!"

"Nah, don't you worry, Naruto-dono's aura shouldn't have that effect here, Mahora is too... indomitable for that to happen, de gozaru," Nagase Kaede smiled pleasantly. "Why, I bet you, since the Festival started, my friends already have involved themselves in several fights against powerful enemies and triumphed without needing to resort to Naruto-dono, de gozaru."

"Kaede-nee, don't try to bluff to make our boring old school look better to your Academy sempai," Fumika sighed sadly. "The only fights Negi-kun and the others get themselves involved into are fights over which girl gets to clean his erasers today..."

"Ah, yeah, you mentioned that Sensei in your letters, didn'tcha, Kaede-chan?" Naruto asked the local kunoichi. "Some kid that attracts almost as many girls as Sasuke, but being far less of a-"

"She never said Sasuke any kind of a-," Sakura hissed, not-that-discreetly pressing a fist against Naruto's Adam apple while Hinata frowned in silence. "And if you finish that sentence, I'll blow up your-!"

"Oi, oi, just kidding, mostly, Sakura-chan...!" the blond young man laughed uneasily, slowly pushing the super strong fist back. "Anyway, I'd really like to meet that kid before we have to go back. From the letters, he sounded really nice!"

"Oh, he is!" Fumika swooned. "Negi-sensei's the best!"

Fuuka shrugged with a kittenish smile. "A bit too naive and too goody-goody, but he's cute!"

"Yeah, nothing like Sasuke then," Naruto chuckled to himself under Sakura's disapproving glare. "Good thing Sasuke's not here either way, he'd just steal all of that kid's fangirls away."

"Oh, no, we're a tough breed here at Mahora, Sempai," Fuuka said. "We don't just fall heads over heels for every pretty face that comes along, you know! Haruna's dad, he has the same kind of mysterious 'jobber aura' effect you have, coupled with the same 'unbeatable Casanova' effect your friend has, and yet, whenever he comes visit, nobody will give him the time of the day, or turn around to look at him..."

Fumika blinked, confused. "You... You mean her older brother, don't you, Neechan?"

"Eh, maybe it's both," Fuuka said airily. "It would explain so much about Haruna, and wouldn't surprise me at all."

"That's because everyone in Mahora are pedos!" shouted a boy with a Honnouji/Revocs tee-shirt who was passing by their side, going the opposite way.

"Shut up, you North Korean, go back to sucking on your President's asshole!" Fuuka yelled at the laughing boy's back, flipping him the bird and greatly startling Hinata. "Honestly, I don't know what we ever did to that school! Though they probably deserved it!"

"Well, that's how these things go," Naruto shrugged, taking a moment to paternally pat Fuuka's head. "Our school, well, let's just say it takes things with other schools of our province far further than you guys do..."

Then they had to just stop abruptly, as a green haired young woman had just crashed violent against the pavement at Naruto's feet.

Sakura gasped in horror. "No way! You're getting the Casanova effect too now that Sasuke-kun isn't around...?!"

Hinata decided that this bitch had to die if that was the case. "Maybe we should've brought Sai-san along?" Hinata mildly wondered. Somehow, Sasuke-san's replacement always had guaranteed the Sasuke Effect wouldn't ever take effect on Team 7 again after Sasuke-san's betra- leave of absence and vampirism-induced-sabatical, whether on himself or Naruto-kun. That guy was like an anti-sexiness generator on legs, seriously.

Much to Hinata's relief, however, the girl hadn't just thrown herself at Naruto, and didn't even seem to notice his presence as she rose from the now shattered section of the street where she'd landed. "Chachamaru-chan!" Fuuka and Fumika were shouting at once. "What's going on?!"

"Good morning, Nagase-san, Fumika-chan, Fuuka-chan," the class gynoid politely said, a large blade popping out of each of her arms, making the Konoha trio perk up in interest, despite the girl having her back turned on them. They could see that, further up the street, a girl with short black hair and wearing a full school uniform swung a battle mallet around, very skillfully, as she stared venomously at the girl she'd just brutally attacked and flung around. "Please stand back and stay out of this fight. I wouldn't want to see you harmed as a consequence of my actions."

"Fight! Fight! Fight!-! FIGHT!" chanted the crowd gathering around the place, most already holding cellphones high.

"KARIN, NO!" was shouting a small blonde girl trying to push through the tight crowd. "Damn you, what an idiot, if you harm my servant in any way at all, I'll make you pay worse than ever...!"

"Karin!" Naruto and Sakura immediately said, both flinching at the mention of the name.

Kaede looked at them. "You know that girl, de gozaru?"

Sakura shook her head. "No, but... Karins are always bad news, you remember those letters I sent you on that hussy, right?"

"Ahhhh, yes, now this one does..." Nagase mused. "This one didn't remember that name at first, since Sakura-dono almost always calls her 'the cow', 'ugly four eyes', 'skank' or 'slutty nerd' instead de gozaru..."

"Anyway, why don't you guys just send each other e-mails like all normal people do?" Fuuka just had to take a moment to ask what she couldn't hold back anymore.

But then Karin and Chachamaru were charging at each other again, and that fateful question had to be briefly shelved aside.

* * *

"Wasting his time at a dinosaur expo. Right now. Really," the Batman grumbled to himself while swinging off the roof on a grappling hook line, heading over towards Dinosaur Land.

Mordred watched him go, asking aloud, "What's the problem with that guy? Didn't he have a childhood?"

"It takes one to know another, I believe," her father mused to herself.

"At least I didn't spend mine mopping floors at a dilapidated castle and seducing squirrels!" Mordred shot back. "Huh, he is a great contrast from the blue knight with the belt of endless weapons and devices who once came to Camelot."

"Wait, you've met Batman-sama before?" Matoi said, sounding surprised.

"A version of him," Artoria said. "He claimed to be from another universe, and even during our brief association it was obvious he was an upstanding champion of good and justice."

"I really wanted to punch his face in. Drawing eyebrows on your mask? That's just stupid!" Mordred shot back. "Well, Master? I grow impatient! Let us put an end to this farce already! Summon Kiyohime, you have to do it sooner or later! Huh?"

Ritsuka was, much to her confusion, conferred with Matoi on the sidelines. "Are you sure that will work?" the boy dubiously asked. "For sure?"

Matoi shrugged. "There's nothing completely sure in this treacherous life, but if I know a lady's loving heart, odds are it's bound to work. It's exactly why I haven't killed Forehead yet, if it worked on me, it should work on her as well."

Ritsuka gulped. "W-Well, if you say so, I'm willing to trust you..."

Mordred looked at Chisame. "What's your lover scheming now, wench?"

"She's not my lover!" Chisame screeched. "And how should I know what goes through her twisted head at any given point, anyway?!"

Ritsuka sighed, stepping ahead to the middle of the group. "Fine. Let's do this. I've stalled enough."

"Well, glad to see you finally realized that!" Illya snipped, tapping a bare foot down.

Ritsuka sighed while Lancer, Mordred, Shielder and Rider all readied their weapons tensely, and Sayoko, Berserker and Matoi moved around to shield Illya and Chisame with their bodies. Artoria simply grabbed Shirou and strongly slammed him on his feet behind herself, making him sigh. "Come forth to your Master..." the Chaldean Master shouted, lifting the fist with the flaring Command Seals. "Kiyohime!"

"Does anyone think it unfair he essentially has unlimited Command Seals?" Shirou mused from behind Artoria. "No one? Just me? Figures. I wish Tohsaka were here, _she_ would understand…"

* * *

Kuchiki Rukia (remember her?), in a modest blue-striped bikini and summer hat and sandals, blinked as she thought she recognized some young man in the Dinosaur Land crowd she and the always-apathetic Ichigo were scouting, the boy sweating in an over-sized red tee-shirt and shorts.

"Ichigo," she mumbled, pointing at the black-haired boy, who hung out with a taller, lighter-haired laughing male student. "Isn't that the guy we sent to Soul Society a few weeks ago, the errant spirit of last year's murdered student? Itou Makoto, I think?"

"Maybe," Ichigo shrugged, looking instead at his handheld spiritual detector, shaped like a black cellphone. The ever useful Denreishinki, making its Unequally debut! "Look, Rukia, don't worry too much if you see someone who'd died back in a flesh and blood body, we only take care of spirits. We deal with dead people. If they're living, undead, vampired, or otherwise solid, not our problem. If they're back to life, odds are they were wished back by a Puella Magi, or someone punched the timestream to prevent their deaths, or a ninja order summoned their souls back into their bodies," he nearly whispered, the happy bystanders oblivious to his explanation over the prattle of their own conversations and the roars of the dinosaurs. "That's not our jurisdiction, if they had a problem with it we'd have been told about it, so let's just stick to the plan, okay?"

Rukia blinked. "Wait, are you telling me people can actually punch the timestream? How does that even work?!"

Ichigo shrugged once more. "Never seen it happen myself, but I've heard of it happening at least once. The higher ups don't like talking about that, so I don't ask. Ah-hah, they're really close now," he grinned. "That way!" He pointed around another corner, leading towards the Jurassic Train Ride, and began all but jogging there, forcing Rukia to follow him closely, almost pushing through the crowd while apologizing nonstop. "Come on, they're two big ones, don't waddle!"

"I'm not jumping in like this, not without considering the situation first!" Rukia snapped, gesturing at all the people around them. Even if she could easily duck into a bathroom at any time, leap out of her body, and take care of matters in her Spirit form, she wasn't that eager at all to tackle another Hollow or two... if that's what they were, Ichigo himself wasn't sure yet... in broad daylight, in such a tightly packed area. Not to mention she cringed from the simple idea of leaving her body alone in a public restroom, that was just asking for trouble. Even if Ichigo looked after it in the meanwhile, that was bound to get him in trouble with the security guards.

"There they are!" Ichigo pointed at a line of passengers boarding the latest red train about to take off for the deluxe tour through the Jurassic Land. Rukia blinked, instantly recognizing Negi-sensei with a much older girl. So they were right about him being a precocious ladykiller playing dumb the hole time? Huh, looked like she owed Honsho and Natsui money then... But she immediately forced herself to be professional, and focused on the two spirits marching behind them instead. One of them looked like a distinguished, handsome samurai, vaguely reminiscent of Byakuya-niichan in physical appearance, and the other was a pretty girl in sexy Catholic warrior nun cosplay, with a massive cross staff at a side.

"They look powerful," Rukia murmured to Ichigo, "but I don't feel they're Hollows..."

"Damn, no," Ichigo grumbled. "I know those presences, now they're this close. They are Servants."

"Servants?" Rukia echoed, before she remembered what that meant.

Kurosaki nodded. "Think of familiars used as bodyguards and attack dogs by magi, but taken from the spiritual presences of famous warriors from yesteryear. I'd felt several Servants around this school over these weeks, but... these two are different, that must be why the Denreishinki reacted to them."

"Yes, Ichigo, I was there when we met the talking duck with the gun, remember?" Rukia said dryly. "I still have the mask I got from that time. Do you think they'll cause any trouble?"

"Well," Ichigo huffed, "Servants are unlikely to attack people unless their Masters tell them to, and most Masters aren't stupid enough to blow their covers in the open like this, so..."

"This is Mahora. There's ALWAYS someone stupid enough if you just stand still and wait," Rukia pointed out flatly.

"Oh, Kurosaki-kun! Kuchiki-san!" greeted a happy voice from behind them, making them shudder.

"See?" Rukia said.

Pale faced, they turned around to see Inoue Orihime walking up to them, followed by an eyebrow-raising Honsho (still no Naba) Chizuru. "It's been a while, Kurosaki-kun...!" the tallest of the two newcomers chirped melodically, coming close enough as to make Ichigo take an instinctive step back. Sometimes Rukia had to wonder what was wrong with him, even if she couldn't deny this wasn't the time for a- "Are you on a date?!" Inoue then asked aloud, making Rukia violently choke on her own tongue.

"Hime-chan," Chizuru sighed as Ichigo also broke into a sudden fit of coughing, "Why are you teasing Rukia-chan like this? She's gone over it time and time again, Kurosaki-san's just her friend, she's just still after all this time helping him get used to Mahora, and she doesn't have taste that bad..."

"D-Damn straight she doesn't!" Ichigo suddenly straightened up. Inoue blinked adorably, regarding the situation before breaking into another wide smile.

"You realize you just insulted yourself saying that, right?" Rukia said with a sly smile.

"Oh, but you were in a friendly stroll along the expo all the same, weren't you? Yay, that's good!" Orihime clapped. "I love this expo too, that's why I come every year! If you'd asked me before, we could've come all together, then we'd have four times the fun!"

"Actually, I make a habit out of never going out with boys, thanks all the same," Chizuru deadpanned, even though nobody was paying her any attention.

"So you were about to get into the train, weren't you?" Inoue kept on asking Ichigo, eagerly pushing herself towards him, chest bouncing up and making his face twitch slightly. "So were we! Let's buy the tickets fast, before it takes off, then!"

"We were?" Chizuru blinked, then grinned lecherously at the idea of riding a crowded train with Inoue and Rukia all through an exotic location where all sorts of beasts would pop up, making impressionable young ladies shriek and hug their companions. "I mean, sure we were! Why would we come here otherwise, just to kill some time until the concerts started? I'm in such a good mood today, I'll pay for everyone's tickets, dammit!"

"... okay," Ichigo shrugged, telling himself that, if they were there already, least they could do was keeping those Servants watched all the way through. Just in case.

Rukia stared at him. "It's not like a gentleman, to let a lady pay for him."

"It's not like a modern gentleman to deny a lady her right to pay if she wants to," Ichigo countered.

Chizuru blinked. "Ah, okay, I guess Kurosaki-san is a gentleman of sorts after all Rukia-chan. Usually, when this kinda thing happens, men just say 'it's not like Honsho is a lady' instead..."

Rukia couldn't help flinching slightly at the casual tone Chizuru had when she said this. It was easy to forget people like Honsho, often caught up in the rapid flurry of the usual high school shenanigans and playing the roles of hyper class clowns, had their own feelings as well. Rukia couldn't help wondering if Honsho was just pretending to be that dense most of the time, or if she had just been left that numb by others' disregard of her own femininity and emotions. It seemed a bit unfair either way, even for someone who arguably earned part of that abuse by being that obnoxious...

She felt someone touching her butt. "Ooh, not much growth up to, but getting nicely rounded down below," Chizuru chirped.

Rukia sighed and punched her. Give me back my concern!

But then, like always, there were more important things to worry about right now, wasn't that right? Rukia sighed as her friends rushed to buy some last minute tickets, thanking the heavens the line wasn't that long or slow right now. With any luck they'd catch the same ride as Negi-sensei and they'd at least get a few answers out of all this trouble...

* * *

"Fight! Fight! Fight!" the crowd chanted, while somewhere else, Gandolfini quickly dispatched Takane D. Goodman and Sakura Mei away to stop the situation as soon as possible. That was something Yuuki Rito ignored at the time, of course, but he still knew enough about the ways of mages by now to suspect it wouldn't be any long before they sent anyone to stop the fight and arrest everyone involved if Lala couldn't break it herself like right now...

"Yeah, fight! Fight on! Fight, Chachamaru!" Lala cheered from where she stood by Rito's side, pumping a fist up. The boy sighed, causing his alien fiancee to give him a surprised look. "What? What did you expect, Rito? Clearly, this is something Chachamaru has to do on her own! It'd be rude to do it for her!"

Nana nodded. "Yeah, not that I'm expecting for you Earthlings to understand the honor of a true warrior in... Wait a sec," she squinted, looking past the fight, at the other end of the crowd. "Aren't those Haruna's classmates and the people from that 'Konoha' place they introduced to us like a hour ago?"

"Thank you, Deviluke-sempai, I promise I'll finish this as soon as possible," Chachamaru said, dashing again to slash at Karin, only to have the black haired girl leap over her, striking at her back with the mallet. There were several deafening boos from the crowd then, owing to Chachamaru's popularity in Mahora, but neither combatant paid them any attention. Chachamaru rolled with the hit that had slashed part of her summer dress' back and slammed a fist against the back of Karin's skull, just hard enough to knock out without hurting permanently.

It didn't work at all for some reason, however, as Karin simply took hold of Chachamaru's arm and slammed her down against the pavement, sending chunks of concrete flying all around, even as the four blurs currently springing from all sides surrounding the Narutakis moved swiftly to catch the flying fragments in mid-air before they could hit the onlookers. Whispering some thanks to the quartet that included Nagase-san, Chachamaru pushed herself to her feet, spinning in the air to kick at Karin, who blocked with her crossed forearms and then rammed forward, headbutting Chachamaru and causing a loud metallic pang to be heard all across the tightly packed street.

Chachamaru was impressed; that foolish attempt against her would have knocked any other human attacker, and yet this young woman remained well aware on her feet, keeping a good defense stance while nervously hopping lightly in place, measuring the gynoid with her cold gaze and waiting for her next move. "Stop that right now, you idiots!" Evangeline screamed then, but Chachamaru had long ago gained a will of her own, and this was one of the rare cases when that will told her to just outright ignore what the Master was saying. She swung along with two fist at once, trying a haymaker against this woman who obviously could take as much punishment as she dished out, but for some reason, it was as if her hit hadn't even connected, greatly confusing her battle sensors.

The mysterious young woman smirked harshly. "A doll like you will never be able to hurt me," she said, then slamming her weapon against Chachamaru's midsection and making her double in utter surprise rather than pain. This speed was even greater than Ku Fei-san's, what was this creature, and from where she came..?

"Special Disciplinary Committee! Special Disciplinary Committeee!" Takane was shouting, terrifying Rito and Nao as they saw her and Mei coming, pushing through the crowd the best they could. Takane inwardly cursed not at being able to make a proper entrance with her magic before things escalated any further, but then again, that only would make things even worse than they already were. "Evangeline McDowell, Karakuri Chachamaru, you are to stop this nonsense immediately!" the blonde howled though a black megaphone with the Mahora logo she was pulling out right now. Quietly, Nao saw that as her cue to quietly vanish away through the multitude in a way the Konoha natives would have greatly admired, had they paid her any attention at the time.

Chachamaru stopped, dropping her fighting stance at once, but Karin simply charged her again as aggressively as before. Lala sighed, pulling out a small device shaped like a bracelet with red eyes, and clasping it around her wrist. "Why won't they just let things solve themselves through violence peacefully...?" she sadly wondered as she calibrated specifications for herself, her sisters, Rito, Karin, Chachamaru and Evangeline. "Pyon Pyon Warp-kun, go...!"

"Princess Lala," Peke gasped, "I don't think that's a very goooooood-!" she managed to shout before they were suddenly taken away by a series of blinding white flashes, making them disappear while a very confused Takane and Mei screeched to a halt in the middle of the crowd.

Naruto's jaw fell, and he dropped all the slabs of broken pavement he had in his hands all over the street. "It's the Rapture! The Christians were right after all, the Rapture's started, believe it!"

"That's obviously not the Rapture, you moron!" Sakura screeched, hitting him on the head with a specially large chunk of concrete that shattered into dust while Naruto only blinked, apparently not affected at all.

"Then what is it?" he calmly asked his teammate.

"It's, it's, it's, I don't know what it is, but it's obviously not the Rapture!" Sakura answered.

"Yeah, but how do you know that for sure?" Naruto insisted.

"The Rapture! The end times!" someone in the audience shouted.

"Let's repent, everyone, the end is here!" a woman cried.

"Cats and dogs living together, panic in the streets!" another yelled.

"Read Twilight!" a hopeful girl said, holding out a book.

Everyone paused, grabbed a piece of concrete from the ninja and beat her to death.

"No, let's just have an orgy while we still can!" some male hopeful said.

"Wait, I thought the Rapture was supposed to take the good ones away, then why did it take the Perverted Beast Yuuki?" Chidori the Not-Whispered said.

"That man is a Saint worthy of heaven!" another boy protested.

Mei looked helplessly at her Sempai with very wide eyes. "Onee-sama? What WAS that, anyway?"

Takane blinked. "I have no idea at all, honestly... But at least, for once, I feel like we dodged the bullet of nudity!"

"See?!" someone else in the crowd pointed at them then. "It's another miracle!"

"I don't want that kind of miracles, I wanna see the blonde's boobs again!" shouted another boy before being promptly punted in the face by Takane.

* * *

"Yay! It worked!" Rito heard Lala chirp in glee as he was slammed down against a hard floor, face first, several warm bodies quickly landing in nonstop succession on him right afterwards. Thank goodness it was a miraculously sof landing, self he'd have broken his back several times over! Now, if the miraculous alien technology could just be fixed so that landing on him wouldn't be needed, that would be even better. He felt about to faint for a moment, but much to his annoyance, he remained conscious, so he could also hear the next thing that was said… wherever they were now.

"Ah!" a lovely voice, very feminine and cute, had spoken almost at the same time as Lala. "Anchin-sama!" In a way, she sounded very similar to Run, which was not a good sign. "Finally, you have found your loving—loving—" Here the voice paused, growing downright dry and creepy, and Rito's dread increased. _**"What is the meaning of this, Anchin-sama?-!-?-!-?-!-?-!-?-!-?-!"**_

Oh dear. Multiple exclamation points. Rito dated a librarian girl, he knew what that meant: a sure sign of a deranged mind.

Rito forced himself to open his eyes. The first thing he saw was that musclebound giant, Berserker, with Negi-sensei's bikini-clad loli sister and some woman in swimsuit Meido attire, standing to the side of what seemed to be some rooftop overlooking the Mahora campus. Then he saw several assorted Ala Alba hang-ons and members, including Emiya, Saber-san, Chisame-san and Matoi-taking, all taking wary steps back from some very cute girl with horns and long light aquamarine hair in a blue kimono (again, she looked a lot like Run, which only gave even more bad vibes than before). She had to be the one who'd spoken right before, judging from her frozen expression, that of someone standing on the very thin border between utter shock and unstoppable murderous intent. Did he say standing? He meant using it to play jump rope, and was about to stop any second now to use it to strangle someone.

Quickly, Rito made peace with his God, asking blessings of the God of Conquest he followed on the Internet as his eyes turned up. Momo's tail swung playfully right above his eyes, while Nana, tangled with her twin in a nude human (or alien) knot right over his also naked frame, seemed to be dazed and stunned, rubbing her head through the stupor of a teleport and fall. Lala had just dropped back from the bare heap of bodies, giggling vapidly to herself while Peke sighed, rubbing herself on the ass. And then there were Karin-san and Evangeline-sama, both of whom were helping themselves back to their feet while supporting their own stunned and slightly trembling figures on Chachamaru and on the black pants of the hapless, icily sweating young man they had just appeared around.

This wasn't someone Rito remembered ever seeing before, although he still looked strikingly familiar by mere virtue of looking like a cheap knockoff of Emiya. His wide, round, fear filled eyes were fixed on that of the girl in the kimono, whose breathing was growing higher pitched and quicker by the second as he failed to answer her question properly, only producing a short series of incomprehensible monosyllabic sounds.

A figure in horned armor who had been standing aside leaned down, looking at the no less confused and fearful Rito, and simply gave him some curt but sincere advice. _"Run. Fast."_

Run to where?! He was pinned under several bodies, including that of Chachamaru-san, who weighed like a fucking ton despite being so slim! It was a miracle he was still breathing, he couldn't squirm away, much less walk! Run? This weirdo might've been asking him to fly to the Moon and it'd have been the same! He tried to point this out but had no more luck communicating himself than the poor man's Emiya, only managing to blurb out a weak, "Ah, oh, wha, what, who are you."

"ANCHIN-SAMA!" the girl in the kimono roared, her patience already at an end, and she threw herself towards the knockoff's throat with downright genocidal mania. Yes, genocidal, no way this time was she going to stop at only killing the traitor, noooo…!

Somewhere else, Blackbeard looked back over his shoulder, puzzled at not hearing Kiyohime ranting and chiding him anymore.

"Hmmm?" the grizzled pirate scoffed, realizing his fellow Servant, indeed, was not there with him anymore, having disappeared while leaving no trace.

Ah well. Maybe she'd just grown tired of nagging at him and decided to leave on his own, to quickly find the Master herself. _Women,_ Teach thought while shaking his head to himself, they had no patience at all, and often no appreciation for the beauty of arts either!

At least, he reflected while keeping looking through all the doujinshi at display in the Manga Fair he'd dragged Kiyohime into some time ago, he now had the time to wait for the Master properly there, in this palace of artfully artisitic goodness. Yeah, like he'd told that impatient little twit back then, the Master was bound to come here sooner or later, right? It was logical, Blackbeard was his best Servant after all, and that was the place where Blackbeard would most likely be, so it made perfect sense Master would come here to look for him. So he wouldn't move away until that happened! Stupid Kiyohime, if she was gone forever, then good riddance! A 3-star getting ideas above her rarity, that's what she was. Although she WAS pretty as hell, but then again…

"May I help you?" Amano Hikaru, the college aged President of Haruna and Harumi's manga circle, smiled at the tall gaijin while approaching him, arms carefully folded behind her back and chest studiedly thrusted ahead in the perfect customer enticing pose she'd mastered over the years. "You look like a gentleman of fine tastes, what's your preference, O-nii-chan…?"

Blackbeard, with flaring red cheeks and a large goofy grin, held up a copy of the latest Magical Heart Kokoro-chan H-doujin. "How many gold pieces f'r this one, Missy?"

… it wasn't like this place was without its own beauties, either!

* * *

"- and then Gandolfini-sensei just gave up and told us to bring them here to you, Konoemon-sensei," a flustered Takane finished sheepishly as she and the even more embarassed Mei stood behind the three chairs of the Konoha shinobi.

The man behind the desk hummed thoughtfully. "I see..."

"Why does your head look like a cucumber?" Naruto asked then, making Sakura and Hinata facefault.

"I'm part alien, actually," Konoemon said.

"Ohhhh...!" Naruto said, then grinned, giving him a thumbs up. "Man, that's awesome! Aliens are really strong, we just fought this really badass alien goddess who gave us a whole lotta-"

"Uzumaki-san, that's only Mahora Humor!" Takane barked sternly.

Naruto blinked, looked disappointed, and then asked Konoemon, almost moaning, "You weren't just joking, were you...?"

"Of course I was joking, young man, why would I have any alien royal blood running through my veins?" Konoemon huffed, then made a huge and completely unsubtle smirk and wink at Naruto. The blond boy chuckled, then nodded with a secretively smile of his own as Sakura helped Hinata back up, they and the other girls rolling their eyes at the exchange.

"Naruto, will you stop making us look bad in front of everyone we run into here?" the pinkette complained. "Don't you have any idea who are you talking to? Konoemon-sensei and the Third Hokage-sama used to be friends!"

Naruto blinked again. "Seriously?!"

Konoemon nodded. "Of course, ours was an intergenerational friendship. That young whippersnapper Sarutobi-kun was much younger than I, but yes, we were fairly close for a while."

"Then why didn't you go to his funeral?" Naruto asked. "You became enemies later or something?"

"No, no, it's just I had a really bad backache that weekend, so his disembodied spirit came over to tell me it was okay, I didn't have to bother, he understood how bad backaches could be in your advanced age," the old man replied. He paused to take in the expressions of the youngsters before him, which couldn't help but betraying varying degrees of disbelief, before he calmly added, "What? That's easy for those of us who are in communion with the greater forces, you know! Anyway, how's Tsunade-chan doing? Has she gambled half of the village away yet?"

"Actually, we won half of that half back last month, and in the other half we've got a really nice LexCorp Mall, an incredible Starbucks and an Animate, so I suppose things are working okay so far," Sakura sighed. "She promised she wouldn't do it again, and the Tech Council is monitoring all of her online activity at all times, and fifteen Jonin are to follow her whenever she goes for a night out, so..."

"You'd better make it twenty," Konoemon adviced, "that just won't suffice."

"Okay," Naruto said, "but hold the phone a moment, Gramps, Hokage-sama never even mentioned you at all!"

"He did, all the time!" Sakura accused. "But he always talked of him as 'the illustrious principal of Mahora Academy', and you blocked out every sentence with the words 'academy', 'school', or-!"

"Oh, that might be it, I guess," Naruto grumbled, scratching his cheek. "Anyway, Gramps, I still don't get why we're here at all. I mean, we've made it clear, for once none of what happened was our fault!"

"Maybe it was," Hinata said sadly, "after all, we're here on vacation, and we all know the cursed history of shinobi and vacations..."

"Nonsense," Sakura said, "if Tsunade-sama believed that, she wouldn't have sent us here!"

"Unless the intent was to make you someone else's problem for a while," Takane said icily.

"Now that you mention it," Hinata sighed, "they ARE rebuilding the village right now, and there's a law forbidding all shinobi from getting close to the construction crews..."

Takane, Mei and Konoemon exchanged silent worried looks for a moment.

Finally, the old man rasped. "Nobody's blaming you for anything of what has just transpired, Hyuuga-chan, Haruno-kun, Uzumaki-kun. It's just, well, Gandolfini-kun tends to overreact, and can be a bit paranoid at times. The idea Tsunade-chan would dump you on us to get rid of you for a while is quite silly, that couldn't be it..."

Sakura blinked. "Why does she get a '-chan' and I get a '-kun', Sensei?! I know I'm not THAT feminine compared to her, but then, who in the world is?!"

 _Somewhere, Emiya Shirou sneezed._

"You're masculine even compared to Jack Rakan, I'm sure," Takane grumbled under her breath. Escorting the girl to Gandolfini's surveillance post, and then here, she had not grown exactly fond of her or the boy, who made her feel like her head was being filled with cotton and episodes of Seinfeld, although she liked Hyuuga-san just fine. Takane was, after all, the type who was into sweet, submissive, caring and softspoken girls. Needless to say, under her respectful silence, Mei was getting all sorts of danger signs from Hyuuga-san and just wished her away ASAP, while she couldn't help but noticing there was something rather appealing about Haruno-san. She also disliked the guy, though.

"What was that, Goldilocks?" Sakura sharply asked Takane, who in turn was beginning to remind her too much of Ino for comfort.

Takane looked aside. "Nothing."

"I'll tell you what," Konoemon told the trio. "Since you are here, our staff have their hands fuller than usual this year, and since you're tried and proven professionals in stopping crisis and minor issues alike, I will contract you for a simple C-Rank mission. Not to insult the capacities of our local forces, like the ever hardworking Takane-kun and Mei-chan, but if you feel you've been slighted by our overzealousness, please allow us to make it up to you by assigning you this, proving we do trust you as good allies and disciples of Sarutobi-kun and Tsunade-chan!"

"Sir!" Takane gasped. "Why do I get a '-kun' and only Mei gets a '-chan'?! I am _very_ feminine!"

"Yeah, just a little bit more masculine than Gai-sensei..." Sakura chuckled, elbowing the also chuckling Naruto.

"What did you just say?!" Takane protested.

"Nothing!" Sakura and Naruto grinned at her.

"Of course," Konoemon said, "if you feel you are far above C-ranked missions by now, after everything you have achieved, I will understand and just hope I haven't insulted you any further..."

"Sir!" Hinata said, taking the initiative this once, and sitting very straight. "You haven't insulted us at all, Sir! We'll be glad to do anything for a friend of Konoha like you, Sir! What is the mission's assignment, Sir?"

Takane wondered if this girl was somehow related to Sagara Sousuke.

Sakura blinked. "Hinata-chan! When you want to, you can be quite the soldier! See?"

Konoemon sighed. "I just want you, since you were at the scene of the events, to track Eva-chan and the other students who disappeared, including the mysterious girl Takane-kun and Mei-chan couldn't recognize. No confrontation, just observation. Then deliver a report about the circumstances behind and around this conflict, that's all I'm asking from you. It may sound basic and boring enough, but don't grow too confident, Eva-chan can be a big box of surprises under a very small and innocent looking package, heh heh..."

Naruto squinted in suspicion. "Gramps. You aren't just reacting to Granny dumping us on you by dumping us on someone else in return, are you?"

"Gracious goodness, no. Why would I dump you, if I thought you to be a potential bother, on someone else, especially a very dear and close honor student like Eva-chan? Now, I'll give you a map to her home far, far away and deep in the woods filled with magical monsters, very far from the Festival and its crowds, where you can start investigating at your own leisure..."

"See, you ARE dumping!" Naruto accused.

"He's not!" Sakura growled, grabbing him by an ear and pulling on it.

The ghost of Sarutobi Hiruzen hanging shortly behind Konoemon's desk snorted. "The boy's right, and you know it."

"I don't know what are you talking about, Sarutobi-kun," Konoemon innocently said while reaching into the desk drawer for the objects meant to deal with pests, and pulling out the 'Guided Direction to Eva's' mini booklet.

"What was that, Sensei?" asked Takane, Mei, Sakura, Hinata and Naruto.

"Nothiiiiiing!"

* * *

"No fighting! No fighting!" Shirou commanded.

"Wh-why are all of you naked?!" Chisame shouted.

As one, everyone pointed at Lala.

"Besides that!" Chisame cried.

"Anchin-sama! Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, Anchin-sama, please please please die die die die die die die die die!" Kiyohime cried as she plowed her way through the barrage of Servants throwing themselves into her path to stop her. Their combined might would have succeeded quite easily as well, had this not been a comedic scene. But, alas.

"Well, you'll see, Pyon-Pyon Warp-Kun only can teleport itself and living organisms, artificial sentients included, so it can't teleport your clothes with you!" Lala explained as she happily threw herself into the fray. "Although for some reason Karin kept her mallet with her, this demands further research...!"

"Who in the world is Karin? The Kugimiya lookalike?" Matoi inquired.

Chisame threw her hands up and headed for the stairs. "I'm going to my room to look for clothes for you..."

"Yes, you do that, please!" Lala laughed while taking hold of one of Kiyohime's arms. "That's why I set these coordinates, after all! Haruna's got a lot of cool clothes for everyone in her room, too!"

"I'm not getting any of those!" Chisame barked as she quickly made her way down, hoping they wouldn't end up toppling the building and burying her under the rubble.

Down below in the streets, Momioka Risa sighed. "Maybe you're right and I imagined that everyone was naked, and zombies, and riding dinosaurs and stuff, Mio-chan," she told her best friend, fanning herself with the hand not holding her large glass of tropical juice, a hand for once not used to grope those against her, "but I still don't wanna go with the nurse, I'm telling you, the last time we went there, I could swear-"

Then she gasped and her eyes became diminutive as she saw, shooting up from the top of a nearby building, a massive shirtless man with more muscles than a full Olympic weightlifting team abusing steroids spinning across the air in a perfect vertical line. "...!" she said.

Mio blinked. "What's up now?"

"Look! Look that way, that's the kind of thing I'm telling you about!" Risa grabbed Mio's head and forced it around just short of hurting her neck, making her look that way. However, by then Berserker had already landed back on the rooftop from the other Berserker's perfect throw, and Mio just blinked cluelessly.

"You mean you've been freaking out about the clear summer sky and a distant vague rumbling, like those of a perfect bowling strike?" the meganeko guessed.

"Waaaaugggghhhh!" Risa yelled. "This ain't fair at all! I'm not going crazy!"

Mio sighed and patted Risa on the cheek. "There, there. It's all right. Here, put your hand on my crotch and well amek exhibitionist love until you feel better…"

"Mio-chan, this isn't the sort of thing unscheduled hedonistic carnal pleasure can solve!" Risa wailed, but put her hand there anyway. Who knows, she could be wrong!

Chisame came back to the roof holding several changes of clothes and shaking small chunks of ceiling out off her hair. "That was Berserker being slammed against the rooftop, right? It's a miracle the whole building didn't go down. They used to build them to last, huh..."

"It won't happen again!" Illya snarled, then angrily stared up, way up, at the contrite Heracles standing before her. "Right?! I can't believe it, for you of all people to be humiliated that way by her of all people!"

"He wasn't defeated by Kiyohime-sama," Matoi calmly said while walking up to where Kiyohime was now being held against the rooftop by the combined efforts of the Sabers, Rider, Lancer, the Deviluke sisters, Chachamaru, Karin, Evangeline and Sayoko, all of them applying restraiing pressure on her back, scalp or limbs, and barely managing to keep her down with great efforts. Even so, Kiyohime kept on trying to chomp and literally spit fire at them, until Karin pressed a bare foot against her mouth, forcing it close. "He was defeated by Love itself, the greatest force in all of existence, so there's no shame on having lost to it!"

"You're thinking of money!" Illya angrily retorted.

"No, obviously she means evil," Evangeline corrected.

"No, obviously she's referring to the Deviluke empire!" Nana declared.

"You're all wrong!" Shirou interuppted, surprising everyone. "Clearly she means JUSTICE!" he cried hotblooded, looking as if he had fireballs for eyes.

"It's DEEP LOVE!" Matoi cried, annoyed at them ruining her moment. ""DEEP LOVE, damn it! Now SHHH!" she told them, before frowning at the females holding Kiyohime down while Fujimaru hid behind the sweatdropping Shirou and Rito (who had resorted to covering his privates with his hands until Chisame handed him a bedsheet to throw over himself). Then the stalker clapped and shouted, "Enough of this! Don't be so cruel to a poor, gentle soul who is hurting from the perception of betrayal!"

Kiyohime blinked and looked up at Matoi. "Hrm?" she mumbled through Karin's toes.

Matoi gestured grandly towards the female Berserker. "I salute you, O Kiyohime, Patron of Japanese Lovers such as myself! I see Fujimaru-san hadn't exaggerated at all when he spoke so highly of your courage and bravery, only matched by your peerless beauty!"

"Mmm-whmmm?" Kiyohime asked.

Evangeline shot Matoi a jaded stare as Chisame all but forced one of Hakase's sleeping jerseys down on her. It was a few sizes bigger than Evangeline, but it'd still do the job for the time being. "Now what nonsense are you babbling about, fool?"

"Why, how can't you recognize the greatest beauty of our folklore, my example and inspiration, the one, only and true persevering lover, pristine model for all wives-to-be, Kiyohime-sama?!" Matoi protested. "Deceived by the sweet words of Anchin the Monk, this maiden's sensitive heart shattered when her lover cowardly ran away from her. Many have labeled her reactions to such betrayal as savagery, but from the first time I heard of her legend, during my formative years, I knew differently!" She knelt down, reaching over to grab one of Kiyohime's hands and squeeze it tenderly. "Kiyohime-sama! It's a honor, the greatest honor, meeting you, my heroine, my inspiration! You all but invented the DEEP LOVE for our immortal culture! It breaks my heart now, as your disciple and faithful follower, seeing you humbled this way!"

"Hm," Mordred huffed. "You know, Kiyo here can see right through lies, if you're trying to deceive her she's just going to-"

"I'm not being deceived, shut up!" Kiyohime said, tearfully spitting Karin's foot out of her mouth and staring at her unexpected sympathizer. "You're right, I know liars from sincere hearts with all but a look! And I look into this child's eyes, and I sense a spirit akin to mine! My disciple!"

"My master!" Matoi sobbed.

"My legacy!" Kiyohime proclaimed.

"My everlasting, undying guide!" Matoi nodded.

Evangeline blinked. "Are you... really that sure about that?" she asked Kiyohime.

The Servant lifted her nose haughtily. "My empathy cannot be deceived, you uncouth exhibitionist! This noble person among you doesn't deserve being debased with your company!"

"Oh, you know, Kiyohime-sama, I just endure through everything for my beloved's sake," Matoi magnanimously said. "She is good friends with these people, and while most of them are knaves and fools, I would tolerate anyone's proximity for her!"

Kiyohime nodded. "Of course, of course. Who is the object of your affections then, fair maiden?"

"This angel!" Matoi gushed happily while grandiosely sweeping an arm, pointing at the paling and grimacing Chisame.

Kiyohime looked up and down at Hasegawa, then gave her a thumbs up with her free hand. "You're so fortunate! Never let her go!"

Evangeline sighed. "I suspected this much, but still, this confirmation isn't bad at all to know. Well, except for you, I guess," she added, looking at Chisame. "My sympathies."

"You never gave sympathies to anyone!" Chisame cried.

"That's because I've never met anyone as screwed over as you," Eva said. "Well, except for him, maybe," she added, now pointing at Ritsuka.

"Ah, yes, about that, Kiyohime-sama," Matoi said, trying to pull her heroine from under the pile of bodies still stubbornly keeping her down. "Please take it easy on your beloved, it's not his fault all these naked people appeared around him right when you were summoned."

"Oh, no?" Kiyohime blinked, blushing adorably. "Oh my, have I just committed a mistake?"

"Y-Yeah, she's right!" Ritsuka gasped. "I swear I'd never seen these nudists before, Kiyohime!"

"We're not nudists!" Rito yelled. "Only Momo and Lala are!"

"Guilty as charged," Momo said with an impish smirk.

"Hey! I can be a nudist as well!" Eva protested, beginning to pull the shirt off.

"Don't do that, dammit!" Chisame growled.

Kiyohime frowned. "You mean to tell me, these shameless sluts simply appeared around you right in time to invoke my jealousy, in a mere cruel trick of capricious luck, Anchin-sama?"

"Um... yeah?" Ritsuka shrugged, sweating intensely.

"It's what they always do," Chisame shrugged. "That's why they call Rito-sempai 'the Perverted Beast of Mahora'."

"Those are all accidents! Every time, nothing but accidents!" Rito screamed.

Kiyohime huffed, stared for several moments at Ritsuka's face, and ended up just a saintly smile ( _somewhere, Daidouji Tomoyo sneezed_ ). "Okay! Tee-hee, I can always tell when you're being honest, Anchin-sama, it's just I sometimes jump to conclusions before stopping to look at your adorable features! Please forgive your young wife, I promise I'll become far more trusting in the future, as you deserve!"

Lancer nodded. "That's right, accidents can happen to everyone, especially young men. Why, this reminds me of the time Cu Chulainn went and-"

"Yeah, well," Mashu sighed, "glad we've cleared that out, Kiyohime-san. As you can see, there was nothing between Sempai and these strangely naked accident prone friends of Tsunetsuki-san and her team. Now, maybe you could just sit back and listen as we explain-"

"How we got to kiss Master before you did," Mordred said.

Kiyohime instantly fell into the same shocked, frozen, prelude-to murder expression from before.

Artoria stared Excaliblasts at her son. "Not deserving of a kingdom? I take that back! It's more like you don't even deserve control over a cat!"

Mordred smiled under the helmet. "So worth it!" she said, crossing her arms smugly.

"My sister is going to end up owning all my stuff isn't she?" Ritsuka said weakly as he saw Death looming so strongly it looked like a cute girl wearing a top hat, who waved pleasantly at him. "Since I'm going to die."

 _ **"ANCHIN-SAMA!"**_ the girl in the kimono roared, her patience already at another end, and she threw herself towards the Emiya knockoff's throat with downright genocidal mania. Again. And yes, genocidal, no way this time she was going to stop at only killing the traitor, noooo…!

"Don't fight! Don't fight!" Shirou commanded.

"Fight, Kiyohime-sama!" Matoi cheered. "Fight for your love!"

"YOU'RE NOT HELPING, TSUNETSUKI!" Chisame roared.

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

"Here, two empty seats, Fujiko-chan!" a boy said happily, taking his date by the hand towards a set of seats by a window of the train car they'd just boarded. As soon as they tried to sit down however, they were violently shoved off by some invisible force. "Hey, what gives?!"

Trying to sit there again, they only were shoved off again, until the little boy sitting on the next set of seats next to a rather older long haired girl flinched in sympathy at them. "Um, excuse me, but maybe you should try sitting somewhere else? Those seats are, well... electrically charged."

The random extra girl named Fujiko blinked at him. "Electrically charged?"

Negi Springfield nodded. "Yes, you see, I think it's a small breakdown in that particular seat, shocking people with electricity from the train's electrical system. I'm sure it'll be fixed soon enough, I apologize in the name of our hard working management..." Then, as the couple moved away to sit elsewhere, he smiled awkwardly at the curious Black Rose Baron. "You see, I was informed about this previously by, ah, a friend working at Dinosaur Island?"

The Baron blinked, not quite knowing what to do about it, but deciding to accept it for the time being. "Oh, I see, of course you would be interested about these installations... I mean, from what I have observed from the shadows, that is..."

Huffing to herself on one of the seemingly empty seats, her fists on her knees, the spiritual form of Ruler grouched. "That's why I thought we shouldn't be riding this car while sitting, it's rude to those who paid their tickets properly! Now Professor Negi will think we're taking advantage of him to go along on a date, or something ridiculous like that!"

"Professor-dono wouldn't do that, I'm sure," Assassin said, relaxing back on his seat while closing his eyes with a soft, confident smile. "He's too innocent to read anything into our strictly professional relationship as allied Servants on a confusing and challenging battlefield. And now, dragon sightseeing, I suppose. A pity George isn't here, he'd have liked this."

"I'm pretty sure they call them dinosaurs now," Ruler said.

Assassin shrugged. "They may call them whatever they want, but they always will be dragons to me."

"I kind of agree, but still, when in Rome-!"

"Start worshiping the Roman gods?" Assassin opened only one eye, then regaled her with a smug teasing little smirk.

Ruler seethed at him, but before she could tell him what was what-

"Oh, Negi-senseiiii!" called out a girl's voice as Negi turned around, blinking at four students he recognized even though he didn't teach them. But he was familiar with Honsho-san's long list of reports, as was every other teacher in campus, of course, and he knew of Kuchiki-san and Kurosaki-san through Sayo. And he'd also been called in once to give an opinion on some of Inoue-san's drawing assignments by Takamichi. They'd been... oddly polarizing among all consulted teachers, with Fujimura's 'this chick's nuts' being the most widely accepted by the end of it. And now here she was, Inoue Orihime herself, waving happily at him as she entered the car in the company of Honsho, Kuchiki and the sour-faced Kurosaki. "I knew that was you, what a happy coincidence! Maybe you don't know me, but-!"

Negi nodded quickly. "Oh, yes, I do know you, Inoue-san! You too, Honsho-san, Kuchiki-san, Kurosaki-san! What a pleasant surprise, seeing you here!"

"Ah! See, guys, see?!" Orihime turned to Ichigo and Rukia. "I told you, Negi-sensei knows and loves everyone in the academy! He's Mahora's Little Miracle Who Could!"

"Not The Little Miracle Who Necessarily Should, though," Chizuru chuckled at Orihime's enthusiasm. "Whoa, Sensei, you just keep pulling them older, don't you? This new lady friend of yours, you plucked her from college, didn't you?" she joked, in that sorta innocently insensitive, callous, blunt and foot-in-mouth shortsighted way of hers.

"I'm a man!" the Black Rose Baron said, trying to sound manly and badass.

Chizuru, Rukia, and even Orihime and Ichigo stared at her then, with sudden blank disbelief.

Assassin looked back at Ruler. "You know, Ruler-dono, back when I came from, crossdressers used to put more effort into it than this. You aren't enforcing the local rules enough."

"IT'S NOT MY JOB TO RULE OVER THINGS LIKE THAT!"

* * *

Meanwhile, back on the rooftop of the girls' dorms, Heracles now sat on Kiyohime's back, picking his nose as his enormous mass kept her down on her stomach, her limbs all being held by the rest of the Servants present, plus Karin, Sayoko, Evangeline, Lala and Chachamaru. Even then, once again they were having trouble keeping the outraged female Berserker in place.

"You vile fiends! Enemies of love! This won't be forgiven or forgotten!" she swore, trying to kick Karin and Chachamaru off her legs. "Tsunetuski-san, do something!"

Matoi sniffed. "Alas, Kiyohime-sama, I'm only a poor, frail maiden, a child who is powerless against the sworn enemies of your passion. Ah! Had I known the depths of your love ran this truly, I would have objected when I witnessed Fujimaru-sempai's encounters with your fellow Servants!"

Kiyohime paused, blinking at her. "You saw it?! And you let it happen?!"

"How could I have known I would develop such a deep rapport, such a sincere Level 10 bond level with you, Kiyohime-sama?!" Matoi declared with larger than life distress. "The situation was dire! Time had stopped around us, a miracle was needed, and Fujimaru-sempai feared he would never see you again!"

Kiyohime blinked anew. "Come again?"

"Say what now?" Ritsuka said.

"Like a most (well, second most, after Chisame-sama) beautiful butterfly preserved in amber, so Kiyohime-sama stood, far apart from her beloved, frozen due to a whim of capricious Father Time!" Matoi declaimed, gesturing wildly to add to her story. She was a student of Itoshiki, after all, she had learned how to ham it up with the best. "He despaired and cried over you!" This was very true after all. "He kept on thinking of you the whole time, even as he was forced to kiss these inferior women—"

"What?!" Mordred snarled.

"—and a man—"

"That's better!" Mordred approved with a rough nod.

"—to free you from that freakiest of stasis, so he could see your graceful, flawless face again!" Matoi slammed a fist on her own heart. "The whole time he was begging and wailing for alternate ways so he shouldn't have to kiss any other! Because he knew that to kiss any lips but yours, Kiyohime-sama, that would be pure, agonizing death for him!" This, too, was strictly true, and Kiyohime was moved by the intensity of Matoi's words.

"T-Tsunetsuki-san…!" Kiyohime said, deeply moved.

"Oh brother," Chisame muttered.

"This is all your fault for keeping her around," Rito said out of the corner of his mouth at her.

Matoi put her fist on her own forehead now, giving small sobs. "Men cannot help being witless. This is why we women must be patient with them, and Kiyohime-sama is after all the ultimate wife, a woman over all women but Chisame-sama. I plead for Fujimaru-sempai's life, for none of this was his fault! If you must blame someone, vent your righteous anger out on the one who mindlessly shattered the watch and altered the natural order of things!"

"Who was that person?!" Kiyohime demanded. "I'll have the skin of anyone who forced Anchin-sama to do anything he didn't want to!"

Illya smirked. "We aren't too sure who did what in the heat of battle, but we think it was him who broke it," she said, pointing at the gigantic muscleman sitting on Kiyohime.

The smaller Berserker paled as the much bigger Heracles took a moment to look down at her, then to roar madly on her face.

"… then again, accidents happen and sometimes no one can be blamed," Kiyohime decided in a very small voice, since now she wasn't consumed enough by her rage as to be THAT midlessly stupid, as to further provoke him. Then she frowned, looking around at all gathered faces around her. "Do you vouch for Tsunetsuki-san's words? Did he actually do it only so he could see me again?"

Chisame shrugged. "I can tell you, he didn't want to do it at all. He was crying like a small child, no, worse, I room with a small child and he's never been that bad…"

"I cannot tell, I arrived after everything was done," Lancer calmly said. "You're a small, right, Kiyohime? Because I found this wonderful souvenir shirt for you…"

"Ditto for me," Eva snorted, "but looking at that guy's disgusting wimp face, do you think he'd take the initiative to kiss any woman on his own?"

"Mind your words, demented dwarf!" Kiyohime growled.

Eva only stuck her tongue out at her while Mordred sighed. "Master only did it for the greater good, including yours, yes. Shouldn't you, who claim to love and know him so well, be well aware he's not that kind of man by now? What kind of lover are you anyway?"

Kiyohime now stared venomously at her. "I have forgotten more about love than you have ever learned in the first place, Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl, and I have forgotten nothing!"

"Why does everyone keep confusing me for Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl?! We look nothing alike!" Mordred said.

"The whole time," Sayoko paid testimony stoically, "Fujimaru-kun was a broken man, constantly shouting your name. 'But Kiyohime!' 'Think of Kiyohime!' I had never seen a man so afraid, so reluctant to break a woman's heart in my life. Each kiss took even more from him than the last one." At that, Mashu flinched visibly. "By the time he was done, he was a broken shell of a man, and all the proof you need is there…"

She pointed at the white pale Ritsuka, who stood feebly behind Shirou, clinging to his shoulders. Emiya smiled at Kiyohime, tightened a fist, and declared his piece. "Fujimaru-san is an ally of Justice, Kiyohime-san! I'm sure he'd never do anything to hurt you! It'd be just like hurting himself tenfold, after all!"

"Aye," Artoria nodded dryly. "Do you want to learn about the depths of true betrayal? Then you only need to listen to the sad story of my marriage, where my most trusted—"

"Yes, yes, I have heard that tale from like twelve different versions of you already!" Kiyohime told Saber, turning the blonde's stoic expression into a disappointed frown. Why did these people make her feel so less unique whenever they spoke to her? Then Kiyohime sniffled and looked all around those encircling her, studying their expressions one last time. "Very well," she solemnly said, lifting her small chin with the utmost dignity. "You have convinced me this wasn't a willing attack on our bond levels, at least not from Anchin-sama's perspective, and his is all that matters. I'm still not convinced the rest of you didn't conspire against him, taking advantage of my absence, but then again I have always known of your cutthroat ways, haven't I, Saber, Shielder, Lancer, Rider?"

"Once again, why am I receiving this treatment as well?" Scathatch wondered. "I repeat myself, I was summoned long after that! I never kissed him! But, should you need a real reason to be furious at me—"

"Don't! You! Dare!" Kiyohime growled while Lancer took a step closer to the terrified Ritsuka. Now Shirou fully understood the real reason why Masters were not to have more than one Servant at a time. "Damn it, you Irish women are all sluts! Sluts! All right, you win. I will spare you for the time being, as much as it hurts me. But I am magnanimous, and I would rather harbor untold pain in my chest than in yours, Anchin-sama. You are that noble, you cannot help being that helpful to everyone. That's why I fell in love with you, after all."

"Um, ah, I'm glad you are so understanding, Kiyo—"

 _"—chan,"_ Shirou whispered to him, proving he'd actually learned something after all.

Ritsuka flinched a little before smiling. "Kiyo-chan."

"Uwaaaaaa!" Kiyohime fluttered in place, pink hearts flowing around her. "Anchin-sama has just called me 'Kiyo-chan' for the first time ever! Our bond has reached a new Ascension Level!"

"See? That was worth it after all!" Illya said.

"That remains to be seen, doll," Kiyohime briefly regained her icy tone while speaking to her. She, after all, knew the Caster Dress of Heaven, and recognized another of her kind when she saw one. "But I will consider leaving this ugliest of affairs a settled matter as long as I, too, get this prize granted to my most bitter rivals."

"Ah, you mean a Pactio?" Chisame said while Ritsuka shivered and blanched, his eyes turning into huge dead blanks. "I'm afraid we'll need Negi-sensei's ermine for that, and right now he's not available, so you might want to—"

"That's no problem, I can arrange for it," Illya shrugged. "Why not? This could be even more fun, so I'm up for it!"

"Wait, you're a magus, not a wizard!" Shirou told her. "Why do you know how to manage a Pactio?"

Illya laughed. "Stupid Onii-chan, I know everything about all kinds of magic! Grandfather may detest wizards, but I knew Nagi-papa was one, so of course I would study all on them behind my elders' backs!" Sayoko confirmed that with a mute nod, since more than once she had to use her Mad Ninja Skillzz to smuggle books on wizardry into the Einzbern Castle for her young mistress. "And of course, all of this time, my secret plan's been to ultimately lure Negi into a forbidden Pactio with me, so he could always supply me with a prana akin to my own…" she began making kissy sounds while her cheeks flushed pink.

"Huh, you really ARE related to Black Archer-chan," Matoi said.

"It's not much of a secret plan if you tell Boya's first and main partner!" Eva told her, pointing her at the disgusted looking Chisame. "Besides, what do you need any extra prana for? You have more than enough to fuel that beast of yours comfortably!"

Illya pouted, unwilling to tell these idiots anything about how her days, actually, were limited and she'd latch onto anything to extend them past the War, up to keeping Negi around as her personal prana battery. "The heart has its reasons that reason can't know, what is that to you? Shouldn't you be chasing after another Springfield anyway?"

"I do, but that's not the point here!" the vampire protested.

"There's nothing wrong with love between siblings as long as it's safe, sane and consensual!" Momo brightly opined while Nana looked aside quite awkwardly.

Mashu, who had a few heart to heart talks with the Caster of the alternate Fuyuki and Leonardo on homunculi and other artificial humans, and knew enough about them as a whole to deduce the actual reasons behind Illya's purpose (well, those beyond her being just that freaky in the first place) silently looked at the albino with newfound sympathy, wondering if they truly were that different…

"Let's see another kiss!" Illya chanted as she drew the circle with chalk Sayoko had diligently supplied her with, dancing around while Karin and Mordred muttered sourly and Kiyohime swung her hips around in renewed happiness. "A kiss for the lamia and her husband, tra-la-la! A marriage ceremony or a funeral, it's all the same for me, as long as there's fu-un!"

Mashu grimaced a little. Yeah, they WERE different after all, definitely.

* * *

Kiyohime primly cleared her throat before addressing her mostly uninterested audience. "Before we go along with this important step in my relationship with Anchin-sama, I'd like to say a few things."

"I thought your name was Ritsuka?" Shirou said, looking at the other boy questioningly.

Ritsuka sighed. "It's a Berserker thing."

"The circle isn't going to stay functional all day, you know," Illya warned, chalk still in hand. "Besides, I'm sure the author wants to move on to the next subplot already."

"Remember back when we had a steady main plot?" Chisame wondered aloud. "What happened to that, I wonder?"

"Since when?" Matoi said.

 _Somewhere, on her way to Dinosaur Land, Chao sneezed and briefly flipped Asuka's skirt up as she passed by her side_.

"Gesunheidt, Mother," Chachamaru said.

Chisame blinked. "What was that?"

"Nothing. Just a minor radar function Chao-san installed on me for some reason. Whenever she sneezes and she's within range, I am to say that. Even geniuses have their little superstitions, I suppose."

Mordred rolled her eyes. "Remind me telling you about some 'Madam Blavatsky' sometime!"

"A-hem...!" Kiyohime said. "I will be brief. Because this speaks for itself! This is the triumph of love! The gods, it has been said, favor and reward those who remain steady and constant on their way, over those who foolishly rush to the finish line! Men's first trysts are most often expendable, forgettable attempts to hone their skills at romance and lovemaking, but she who is the fated true wife shall collect the fruits of those experiences, and that is Heaven's compensation over our patience! She who wins is not who crosses the line first, but the one who makes the most out of it!"

"Huh, no, I'm pretty sure it's the one who crossed it first," Nana disagreed.

Kiyohime, however, was in her own world now, gesturing majestically while Ritsuka whimpered, standing on the magic circle. "So what if I didn't claim the first touch of Anshin-sama's lips? I'm sure it'll stop hurting like hellfire in my chest someday, soothed by the knowledge I will get his best kisses, nay, all of his kisses, from now on! That is my compensation, and I shall accept it with the humble devotion of one who surrenders herself to the often whimsical, but always wise, twists of the force we call love!"

"Seriously, just kiss him and get over with it already," Chisame grumbled. "Not even Ayaka made such a big show out of hers!"

"Let her enjoy it, Chisame-sama," Matoi smiled. "This is her moment."

"And so!" Kiyohime stepped on the circle, reaching with both hands for Ritsuka's shoulders and squeezing them tightly until there was a soft sound of cracking and snapping, accompanied by his low pitched whine of pain. "Let this mark the crystallization of our ever burning love, Anchin-sama! Throught this symbol of the ultimate alliance, I belong to you, and you belong to me, and all is as the Kami intended! I know you're speechless in the face of such a glorious realization, so I shall share your silence and let actions speak for both of us... right now, my love!"

"Eeeee!" Ritsuka whined impotently.

Marie Antoinette gave a heartfelt, long drawn sniffle. "That... That was so charming and beautiful...!"

Matoi nodded in agreement as she applauded. "I feel so honored to have been here to witness this!"

Nana stared at Rider. "Are you sure you're fellow royalty, or did I mishear that part somewhere along the way?"

Shirou shivered. "No, wait, this is wrong! This just doesn't feel just at all, what was I thinking?! Saber, we should-!"

"It is too late to save this kingdom," his Servant grimly pondered, as Kiyohime hungrily lunged ahead and caught Ritsuka's lips on her own. "It's his just punishment for betraying my son to the French."

"Marie isn't French, she's Austrian," Mashu felt compelled to defend the lady. "She was just cursed to live in France."

"... aaaaaaand now is where you realize you have just indirectly kissed the three of us, too!" Mordred laughed, while Marie blushed adorably and Mashu began to violently wipe her mouth over and over with the back of a hand, only to stop when Marie gave her a hurt look.

"Mordred, please. You are embarrassing our Table again," Artoria told her dryly, while Kiyohime's eyes bugged out, and then the circle of light exploded in all directions over the rooftop.

"All right!" Illya cheered. "Now I am one meaningless, laughably small fraction richer than I already was!"

"Does that mean I get one extra bonus this week?" Sayoko asked hopefully.

"You? What did you do at all to get this result, huh?" her young mistress asked back.

Risa looked up from where she and Mio were frenching torridly at the deep end of an alley as they both rubbed flowers against each other, both tugging on each other's bikini tops strings. "Ah!" Risa gasped, pointing up over Mio's shoulder. "Look, look, on the rooftop! Weird things are happening again!"

"Hrrrrmmm?" an annoyed Mio looked back, adjusting her skewed glasses just in time to fail to see the already receding burst of magical light washing off that particular rooftop. "What's your obsession with the juniors' dorms now, Risa-chan? Look, I can go for my old uniform if you're feeling like that today, you just have to tell me..."

Risa sighed in defeat and simply pulled her back towards herself. "Forget it. Screw that, then, or better yet, screw me."

So she did.

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **Plot Hole Corner! With Taiga and Illya**.

"Hello! Taiga-sensei here, hosting a Mini-Taiga Dojo Corner of sorts, where we'll be giving completely reasonable and not thought-long-after-the-fact answers to plot holes in this sprawling saga that might be bothering you dear readers!"

"With me! Adorable assistant Illyasviel!"

"Okay, let's start with an easy one. In Fate/Stay Night VN canon, the iconic clothes Saber wears around the house were given to her by Rin. In turn, those clothes were given to Rin by Father Kirei, who every year would give her clothes Rin hated having to put on."

"Because they weren't slutty enough!"

"Anyway, you may be wondering, then, why in this fanfic Saber still wears the same clothes around Shirou's house, even before meeting Rin, and even though so far Rin and Shirou aren't as close as they'd been in canon!"

"I blame my other brother! He lured Shirou Oniichan away from Tohsaka by having many more slutty girlfriends around! Shirou Oniichan is still a hot blooded man, after all! And so is Saber, where it really matters!" (Illya puts a fist on her own heart).

"... Anyway, redux! The answer is very simple! Those clothes STILL came from Father Kirei!"

"What a shock!"

Emotionlessly, Emiya Kiritsugu held up the white blouse and long blue skirt, then read from the note that came with them.

 _Emiya: I just heard you had adopted a child. I congratulate you on finding a constructive way to channel the sorrow of your loss. To prove there are no hard feelings, I hereby send you a full set of clothes for your child to wear later in life. I assume you won't be alive by the time the child is aged enough as to wear them, but, well, my daughter is one size smaller and they didn't fit her, so why to let them go to waste?_

Emiya growled to himself. "That damn bastard..."

* * *

"Here, wear this!" Shirou smiled as he handed Saber a neatly folded white blouse and long blue skirt. "It should suffice until we can buy new clothes for you!"

"That won't be necessary, I won't be here for long. But thanks." She then held the blouse before herself, and frowned. This definitely wasn't Irisviel's size. "What were these clothes doing in your father's room, however?"

Shirou paused, slowly losing his smile. "I'm sure he was no crossdresser."

"I'm not saying he was, I'm only wondering why-"

"Even if he had been, which I'm sure he wasn't anyway, every man has every right to do whatever they want in the privacy of their own room, and it's not up to us to judge them," Shirou flatly lectured. "I'm sure he had his good reasons to never tell me why he'd have several sets of women's clothings in his bedroom, despite all of his wife's belongings having burned away in Fuyuki..."

Saber paused as well. "Okay. I'll go put them on now, then."

"Yes. Yes, please do that."

* * *

"Wait a second, Sensei. Why hadn't Father just thrown away those clothes, if he hated the creepy priest so much...?"

"You remember the nature of their relationship with the Springfields, don't you? Who do you think was the girl whenever the girls weren't-"

"Ahhhh, no, no, no! CAN'T UNTHINK IT, CAN'T UNTHINK IT!"

"I'm just saying, every broken watch is right twice a day, and that includes Shirou-kun!"

"Ahhhhh! Urusai, urusai, urusai!"

"Well, that's a wrap for now, folks! See you around next time, when we'll tell you why Mistress 9 hasn't killed Precia Testarossa yet, because really, she should have!"

* * *

 **Tohsaka Rin's Rogues Gallery- by Tohsaka Sakura**.

Like any other Great Hero, Oneesan has gathered a lot of recurring enemies around her. And much like the villains any other hero faces, some of them are misguided but ultimately noble, some are utterly wicked, contemptible and despicable (I'll only say this: seaweed) and all never stay in prison very long. Some of them are local to the Four Schools Area, some ran across of Oneesan during her studies at the Clock Tower.

This a list, in no particular order of importance, of Oneesan's greatest and most dangerous foes.

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

Matou Shinji.

Kotomine Kirei.

Cellphones.

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

That Tohno woman.

Sawachika Eri.

Computers.

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

Tenjouin Saki.

Blu-Ray sets.

Shido Maria.

Kimura Kaere (she's good friends with Kaede, though).

Kimura-sensei.

Pedobear.

People with googly fish eyes that stare in opposite directions.

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

Klarion (bum-Bum-BUM!) the Witch Boy!

Microwave ovens.

Rani VIII.

Ryuudou Issei.

Freed Sellzen.

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

Gargamel. Please don't ask.

Jakuzure Nonon.

Kanzaki Karin.

Testarossa-sensei.

That weird woman Oneesan once got a phone call from, who got her angry by telling her of how great Sempai was and how much she loved him, and, well, I can't fault Oneesan on this one, sounds like that was an awful person to me, too. She said Oneesan and I having sex was wrong and unnatural! Can you believe the nerve?-!

Luviagelita Edelfelt.

The 'damn ermine', as she calls him.

Seth Rogen.

The Wayans Brothers.

Bea Arthur (yeah, I don't get this either).


	10. Love and War

The card, as usual, was a little thing of beauty. It featured Kiyohime, standing proudly in her kimono, with her fan unfolded and demurely covering her mouth and chin. The text under the image read _BERSERCER- Ciyohime- Princeps Flamma Draco_ , her given tone was Green and her stellar sign was marked as Moon. She spun around happily holding it high for everybody else in the rooftop to see.

"Heee heeee heee!" she giggled. "Anchin-sama, this is the happiest day of my life! Behold, behold, this is just the first child of our joyous union...!"

Matoi clapped splendidly, laughing along. "Oh, I'm so happy for you, Kiyohime-sama!"

Chisame sighed before looking at Karin. "Okay, now that we've got some breathing room again... who the hell are you? I've never had seen you before!"

Shirou blinked. "Isn't this Kugimiya-sa-" He took a better look at Karin's frowning face. "Huh, sorry, my bad. You really look like her, though...!"

"My name Karin," she dryly answered. "I used to be Kitty McDowell's retainer and bodyguard before she betrayed me..."

"Kitty?!" Chisame said.

Emiya blinked. "Is that a relative of Eva-san?"

Evangeline screeched under Chachamaru's silent, accusing, and for once very cold gaze. "Never call me like that again, idiot!" she told Karin. "You know I always hated it!"

"It was the name given to you by Lady Dana, and while I refrained myself from using it in deference to you, now I've lost all respect for you I pledge back to her cause," Karin replied.

"Don't mention that name either, I hate it even more!" Eva slammed a foot down. "Besides, you could end up summoning her! Don't UQ this up!"

Ritsuka suddenly straightened, very stiff and wide eyed. "Summoning! That's it!"

Mashu nodded. "That's correct, Sempai, you still need to summon Tamamo-san and share the news with her as well..."

At those words, Kiyohime threw back her head and let out a lady-like but unmistakable gloating and evil cackle of villainous victory.

"No, I'm talking about summoning the Demon Pillar!" the boy said, clearly driven out of his mind as he headed over to the edge of the building and spread his arms. "Yoo-hoo, Mr. Local Pillar, I'm here! The Master you want to destroy, come and get me already...!"

"Ah!" Kiyohime sighed sweetly. "Anchin-sama is so sure of our unbeatable power now, he feels ready to tackle the Demon Pillar at once! Such a show of faith on our shared might!"

"Demon Pillar?" Nana grunted. "We have several of those at home, what of them?"

Mashu gave her a startled glare. "You do?!"

"She means they're alien demon princesses and their castle is full of pillars, that's all!" Chisame intervened to nip the wacky misunderstanding before it could bloom. "It has nothing to do with what you're here for! Look, Rito-sempai, Lala-sempai, everyone, these are Servants, much like Berserker or Saber-san, and this is their Master, Fujimaru Ritsuka..."

"Ritsuka? I thought his name was Anchin?" Rito said, giving the chanting, deranged Ritsuka a perplexed stare. "Isn't a Master only supposed to have one Servant at a time? That's what happens if they get more, they're driven insane?"

"Pretty much," Shirou nodded.

Rito shivered in sympathy. "Poor Anchin-san...!"

"Hey!" Kiyohime growled. "Take that back, plebeian! He's the luckiest man in the world, any world! He has me as his wife-to-be, anyway!"

Ritsuka was waving his arms as he tried to leap off the building, only stopped by a bored looking Heracles pinching the back of his jacket to keep him steady in place. "Mr. Demon Pillar, if you don't show up at once, I'm going to fly for youuuuuu!"

Scathach pondered this before turning to Shirou. "Actually, the insanity only sinks in after taking a certain number of Servants, or a single one if they happen to be Kiyohime or Miss Tamamo. Lion King is your sole Servant, isn't she? Perhaps you could accept one more? I'm not that sure I wish to stay under my current contract anymore..."

"Yes, accept her, please!" Kiyohime nodded energetically.

"Father's fate is to be cuckolded!" Mordred approved.

"Like Hades it is! _**MINE!**_ " Artoria growled, suddenly grabbing Shirou from behind and squeezing the surprised boy against herself. "I warn you, I'm a Saber! Lancers are just so much bond points to us!"

"I think I'm willing to contract, actually," Illya offered, taking pity on anyone with any common sense having to work with these people.

"Have you forgotten about my plight already?!" Karin protested, upset at everyone having just taken their eyes off her again.

"Yup, pretty much," Matoi said, "it was pretty pointless and boring anyway. Moving on!"

* * *

 _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ and _UQ Holder_ by Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha.

 _Fate Grand Order_ , _Fate EXTRA_ and _Fate Stay Night_ by Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon.

No makin' no cash outta dis.

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Part Ten**.

 **Love and War**.

* * *

A little girl walked idly through the crowded streets of the Mahora Festival, absently licking on a large vanilla ice-cream cone. Her hair, combed back into two twintails jutting up the back of her head, was the same light blue hair as her large eyes. She wore a simple dark orange one-piece with a frilly short skirt and light shoes, and overall was rather cute, the kind you don't really want to allow wander around on her own in fear she'd be kidnapped.

The fact she was actually a millionaire should probably have further compounded those fears into her parents, but they were… let us just say, 'special'.

"Hey, Pretty Eyes!" a boy's voice called out.

Expressionless, the little girl turned around to see a boy around her own age, barely any taller than her, walking up to her with a cocky grin. He had black hair, longer than that of most boys his age, and the overall look of a young toughie or scrapper. His black shirt was sleeveless and he wore jean shorts ripped around the knees, his feet in cheap sandals. His exposed arms were also quite muscular for a kid who was still younger than ten, too. Yes he had edge! Dark and gritty edge!

"What's a cute kid like you doing walking all alone 'round here?" he asked her, in a smug tone that was at odds with the small goofy drop of snot hanging from his runny nose. "Are ya lost? I can walk you to your Mom and Dad if you want me to!"

"No, thanks," the little girl flatly said. "I'm perfectly safe. I'm being monitored through a special magitech unit controlled and guided by my Sempais at the local Advanced Developments laboratories."

The boy blinked. "Eh?"

She nodded apathetically, giving her cone another lick. Since she hung out with sexless nerd virgins (which included Asuka), it lacked all the sexual innuendo the act would have had if she'd been a member of, say, the manga club. "Should you or anyone else try to attack me, the magitech defenses installed into the invisible drone following me would immediately incapacitate your creepy stalker ass. So your offer is duly noted and even thanked, but also rejected."

The boy grimaced deeply and then laughed. "Ha ha! You're kiddin' me, right? C'mon, there's no need to make crap up! If you need help just tell me! I'm Yamcha!" He flexed his arms up. "My dad brought me here so we can fight in the Martial Arts tournaments, so I'm very strong! He lets me walk around on my own an' everythin'!"

 _Somewhere else, a large black haired man with a mullet and several scars across his rugged face ran madly across the grounds, calling out desperately. "Yamcha! Yamcha-kun! My baby! Has anyone seen my poor boy…?!"_

"… I'm Bulma," the little girl monotoned again. "And I'm not making anything up. Those developments actually exist, and we will share them with the whole world, as soon as Chao-sensei's plan crystallizes."

"…?" the little boy asked, unblinking.

Bulma-chan gave him a long, emotionally dead and uninterested look before deciding, "You're an idiot," and then walking away.

Yamcha-kun simply stood there blinking, then shrugged it off and walked the other way.

Fine! He'd just try his luck somewhere else, then! By the end of this Festival, he'd get his first girlfriend or he'd just give up on girls forever, and it wasn't gonna be the later!

The poor little guy…

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

"I shouldn't be here right now," Negi mused at some point, resting an elbow on the frame of the car window, and his chin on the small tight fist he'd made.

"Excuse me?" the Black Rose Baron asked from the seat next to his. Somehow, despite having secured some of the best seats in the whole car, Negi indeed didn't seem to be enjoying this ride that much. His eyes, while still drawn inexorably to the great sights of animatronic beasts roaming and posing majestically under the railways, were devoid of the spark of joy she'd seen in them whenever he read through a book on dinosaurs, and looked troubled and cold instead. "I... I was under the impression you liked these sights greatly, Negi Springfield! Don't ask me how would I know, but I have my mysterious ways!"

"I know," he sighed, keeping his voice low enough to not disturb the rest of the passengers, and mostly to not be fully heard by Kuchiki-san and her friends sitting behind them. "And I'm sorry if I've disappointed you. I really intended to have my full attention on this encounter, but... other matters have presented themselves recently, matters I've left on my friends' hands while I came here, and... now I can't help feeling guilty."

Nekane blinked, carefully reaching over to touch him on a shoulder. "If it's a serious matter that demanded your presence, why did you come here then?"

"Because," he explained, taking a moment to look at the seemingly empty set of seats where Martha and Kojiro were. For some reason he couldn't shake the idea they were enjoying this ride far more than he was, and actually, his intuition was not failing him. Both Heroic Spirits were absorbed in looking at the large dragons beneath them; even if they were false, they were still large and powerful in their own way, and thus enticing...! Kojiro especially was downright wishing one of those devices would start malfunctioning so he'd have an excuse to strike at it.

This is probably foreshadowing of some sort. A lesser fic would try to be cute about it, but we've known each other for years. Why ruin a good relationship with lies?

"Because," Negi repeated himself, after a pause, with a shake of his head, "I'm convinced you are someone very important to me, one I would place above all others. Even if I were to regret leaving them to their own devices later."

Nekane gasped to himself. _Is he that convinced I'm Uncle Nagi...?_ she thought, completely missing the point.

"Even though I know you're capable and can look after yourself," Negi explained quietly, "I still couldn't stop worrying about your safety. Its been such a long while since I've last seen you... because now I'm convinced that's you... I don't know what I'd ever you if I lost you forever. And maybe I'm overestimating the risks involved here, but..."

"What are you two whispering about?" (Honsho, not Naba) Chizuru asked, leaning forward and closer to them one second before Rukia grabbed her by the collar and pulled her back. "Hey! Ruki-chan, you don't know what this girl's capable of! She attacked me a while ago before we saw you! I'm simply worried about you!"

"I'm a man, and you were harassing me, as I recall!" Nekane briefly snapped back at her, reasoning that was the hot blooded behavior Negi would expect from his father. But then again, Uncle would also have to be portrayed as chivalrous, so she rasped gently right afterwards. "I mean, that isn't the proper behavior for an otherwise lovable lady such as you, and neither is eavesdropping..."

(Honsho, not Naba) Chizuru folded her arms and huffed. "I'm not listening to morality lessons from a cradlerobber!"

Negi blinked. "Ah? Baron-san is no baby kidnapper!" That was, even if he were actually just a Mysterious Phantom Thief and not Nekane, those always stole gems, paintings, money and random knickknacks, never children! Everyone knew that!

Ichigo sighed. "Sensei, that's not what 'Cradle robber' means in this context. It means... You know what, just ask your mother."

 _"Ichigo, he has no mother,"_ Rukia whispered angrily at him while elbowing him in the ribs. _"Pleaseeee...!"_

Kurosaki blinked. "He doesn't?" Then he leaned forward and reached over to pat him on the shoulder. "Geez, sorry 'bout that, then. I'm also orphaned like that, I know how it feels. A father never can replace a mother no matter how much-"

Rukia facepalmed. "Ichigo, I didn't tell you that so you'd dig yourself deeper, just so you'd drop it already!" she hissed again. _"And he's got no father either!"_ she whispered once more, trying to reign him back. Of course she knew that, she couldn't help but having overheard about it during lunches. Even if only a select few knew who Nagi Springfield had ever been, it was no secret the poor cute teacher from overseas was an orphaned child.

"... ah," Ichigo said, still failing to see what Rukia was actually trying to do. He patted Negi's shoulder again. "Sorry 'bout that too, then. Well, truth be told, my father isn't of much help, ever, and you could say he's kind of dead to me..."

Not because Kurosaki Isshin'd ever left the family, but because he was a Soul Society spirit, so he technically was not alive by this world's standards and he wasn't telling a lie, Ichigo reasoned. Yes, his trains of reasoning sometimes went along those lines, as well. No wonder Orihime liked him, they were more of a match than they might look at first. Aren't you glad Rukia is the main character of the Bleach subplot here?

Negi smiled. "That's okay, Kurosaki-san. My father's not actually dead, just... missing, and I'm sure I'll find him soon enough. Besides, I was raised by my older sister, and I couldn't ask for a better mother than her..."

Nekane's supposedly manly chest puffed up with pride as she heard this, and Rukia, Chizuru and Orihime gave her bland looks, suspicion on the subject being easy even for three mostly complete strangers to Negi, one of whom was a famed local Cloud Cuckoolander.

"Ah, I can relate to that, too!" Only Ichigo remained oblivious to Nekane's really bad acting. "My sister Yuzu is like a replacement mother to Karin and I, too! Of course, she's the youngest of us, but...!"

"Well, that's more common than you'd think, too," Negi laughed as a thought balloon showing Yuuki Mikan briefly appeared above his head. "Oh, pteroasurs!" he gushed, in a better mood now as he pointed at several flying animatronics passing by the car. "They're soooo lifelike...!"

Martha sighed. "Well, about time he started paying attention to the attractions, too! What kind of alleged fan of dragons gets distracted by a conversation like that during this splendid sightseeing?"

Kojiro raised an elegant eyebrow. "Aren't Christians supposed to value family above all others but that of your God?"

"Eh, we're supposed to value a lot of things. They can always talk about that later, but this is a gift from God as well and it must be enjoyed as such while we can!" Martha argued, gesturing down with both hands at a pack of slowly moving Triceratops. She sniffed, moved to near tears. "Just look at them, I just wish they were alive so I could preach love into their hearts...!" she exhaled, blushing and quietly swinging her fists back and forth as she spoke.

Kojiro blinked. "Oh. Well, I will say you make a more convincing argument for your religion than Jeanne-dono does. She just keeps reusing the same speech..."

* * *

"So, about this Tamamo woman," Chisame asked Kiyohime. "Who is she anyway? Why's your Master so afraid of her?"

To be honest, Chisame could understand the reason why perfectly, after witnessing this Berserker in action—she was scarier than Illya's, even if nowhere as powerful—but she still wanted to hear it from the woman herself.

Kiyohime made a little concerned frown. "Well, in all fairness, there might be some cause for concern. Unlike I, Tamamo-chan just doesn't listen to reason—"

 _Do you?!_ most of those around her thought, bewildered, with gigantic drops of sweat hanging from their heads.

"She is impulsive, pushy, selfish, overzealous, possessive, obsessive, stubborn, self-centered, and has problems empathizing with others, but other than that, she's a good girl I'm good friends with!" she smiled adorably after counting several of the Caster's character flaws with her fingers.

"You forgot callous, prone to kicking others when they're down, kind of treacherous, occasionally cruel for the mere sake of it, and never lets go of a grudge," Mordred added.

"I thought we were talking about Tamamo?" Ritsuka said. "Why have you two changed the subject to my sister?"

Kiyohime and Mordred blinked. "Huh. Now that you mention it…" the two mused.

Her father gave the Knight of Treachery a jaded glare. "So, in other words, much like your mother?"

Mordred nodded. "Pretty much, yeah."

Kiyohime waved her fan around. "Well, nobody's perfect! We were pen pals for a long time, even before making it to Chaldea. How should I put it, she's… my rival! Maybe you don't have experience with this kind of relationships, but sometimes, strong personalities such as ours develop strong love/hate bonds, where we appreciate each other but we must prove ourselves superior and then rub that superiority in our dear friend's face until it burns them…!"

"Yes, we know of those cases!" said Chisame, Evangeline, Matoi, Rito and Nana all at once, while a shared thought balloon of Negi and Kotaro's faces appeared above them. Shirou blinked, surprised, and gently poked at the thought balloon with a finger until it gently exploded, harming no one, like a bubble.

Karin hummed. "I see. Kitty McDowell had that kind of bonds with Lady Mina Tepes and Lady Rachel Alucard, not to mention Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade, too…"

"Don't mention those names either! Ptooie!" Eva spat venomously. "I hate those bitches from the depths of my black heart!"

"I had never heard of them either," Chachamaru blandly said. "I suppose then I cannot be blamed if I ever lack sufficient battle data to protect you from any of them… _Master_."

"Will you cut the passive-aggressive crap out already?!" Evangeline cried. She glared at Chisame. "I blame you for this!"

"Oh please, don't put this on me," Chisame said. "If anything, she's just taken up your crazy jealous possessive attitude!"

"Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade?" Rito cringed. "Who in their right mind would ever call themselves that- Oh, right, friends of Eva-sama, never mind then."

"N-None of them ever were my f-friends!-!-!" the little vampire roared.

"Okay," Chisame sighed. "Well, even if she's like that, I suppose we still can count on Tsunetsuki to calm her down when she grows angry, right Tsunetsuki?"

"I'm sorry, Chisame-sama," her stalker said. "But even if you ask me, I can't side against my good friend Kiyohime-sama! I know of the sad legend of Tamamo-no-Mae, of course, and my heart suffers for her, but loyalty can't be betrayed! I won't ever side with any rivals of Kiyohime-sama no matter what!"

Kiyohime sniffed, deeply moved. "It's good to see I've found such a good friend here, so quickly…! This Singularity is worth saving!"

"Singularity?" Momo asked.

"Basically, what our world has become in the middle of a major cosmic crisis," Illya sighed. "Well, what's the big deal anyway? Call on the little fox already! We've got two Berserkers, one Lancer, two Sabers, one Shielder and one Rider! What's a Caster to us now? I'd laugh at her even if Heracles were alone against her!"

"The kid's right, let's just stop stalling, Master!" Mordred opined. "The plot needs moving and I want to go sightseeing before the day's over! I heard they even have a surfing pool by the lake! So bring her on! What's there to fear?"

"The more the merrier!" Lala beamed brightly, although she still wouldn't understand what was going on.

"Young Fujimaru," Artoria placed a heavily armored hand on her sort-of son-in-law's shoulder. "Even should the worst come to pass and this Caster were to be a worthy foe, which I highly doubt, I promise I will spare you the worst from her claws, and grant you a clean and merciful death myself instead."

"Damn it father, stop ruining my relationships!" Mordred cried. "You're just jealous because your Master sucks!"

"Hey," Shirou said. "What did I ever do to you?"

"Heeeey!" Kiyohime growled. "Are you implying you'd leave me a widow?!"

Marie sighed sadly. "Must all of my marriages end because of a blade's edge?"

"Saber, no matter the good intentions, threatening others with death is always rude and you know it," Shirou chided. "All life is sacred to a real hero!"

"Uh, no," Illya said as Heracles, Scathach, Mashu, and Mordred shook their heads in agreement.

Ritsuka sobbed slightly, deeply moved. "Thank you, Artoria-san! I knew I could count on you! You Artorias are always reliable in your own different ways…!"

Artoria's right eyebrow twitched. "Please stop saying things that make me feel less unique, however."

"Stupid father!" Mordred said. "If anyone is going to kill Master it's going to be me! I'll show you, I can give him a better death than you can!"

"I'm sorry," Ritsuka apologized honestly before turning around on his heels, tightening a fist and calling out, for better or worse, _"Tamamo-no-Mae! Come here!-!"_

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

"It's... It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen!" sniffled the boy who'd seen Chao Lingshen's bare crotch up close and personal. Kyoto arc, remember? I "I'm so, so fortunate to see this...!"

They were gathered around one of several heavily protected incubation chambers, guarded behind bars and a few constantly active thin laser beams, where tiny newly hatched Tyrannosaurus Rexes were being kept. Konoemon had forbade bringing actual live adult dinos to the Festival (even the man had some standards left, and he'd seen all the Gojira movies enough times to know where such a thing would inevitably go) but his old friend Hammond had finally managed to convince him to let his company display a few of the infants they were preparing for the next attraction in Costa Rica, which surely wouldn't end in death and dismemberment this time.

This is probably foreshadowing. It's so obvious pretending otherwise by not mentioning it would be insulting your intelligence, and if you're still reading this fic you must be pretty intelligent by now.

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) adjusted her glasses on and scoffed. "Eh, I'd have thought they'd be more impressive than this. The runt doesn't even roar, it only lets high pitched whines and pees around!"

"It was just born yesterday, what were you expecting?" Rukia asked her. Ichigo was just standing aside, completely uninterested while reading the latest text message from Hiyori. He'd seen dinosaurs before after all. What where did you think the ghosts of all the dinosaurs had gone? She was warning him about some hush-hush rumors concerning his current status on Earth, but Ichigo doubted anything would actually come of it. Bureaucracy in the land of the dead was even slower than that of Earth, since the higher ups had literally eternal terms in office, and even an execution order was often delayed enough for the sentencee to literally reincarnate before the sentence could be carried off. Heavenly bureaucracy was even worse. Why do you think the Second Coming was taking so long?

However, the threat of Inoue was very active and present instead, as she proved a second later by sneaking behind him with Matoi-esque stealth and leaning up to curiously look over his shoulder, briefly producing a cartoonish sound effect. "Kurosaki-kuuuun?" the tall buxom redhead asked, looking at his weird looking phone with bright inquisitive eyes. "Whatcha doin'...?"

* * *

Isabella rubbed her tiny nose. "Sorry," she smiled at her oblivious crush. "Some sort of summer flu, I guess!"

"Ah, well!" the triangle-headed boy nodded. "Those tend to be fleeting, so don't worry too much. Anyway, this is the latest teleporter Ferb and I are working on! It should be able to take us to Japan as soon as it's finished."

"Japan?" Isabella asked.

Phineas nodded. "Yeah, well, we read in the Internet there's a major school festival going on right now, and we'd like to visit, apparently they're going to have some really interesting science expos..."

Oh brother.

* * *

Anyway, Ichigo promptly gasped and shoved the phone down into his pocket, startled over being taking by surprise like this. Was he getting rusty after all those weeks of inactivity?" "N-Nothing, it's nothing!" he alleged. "Just a text from a friend from my old school, asking how I was doing..."

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) looked back at him. "Male or female friend?"

Ichigo growled. "A girl, but it's not like she likes women...!"

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) smirked petulantly and tossed some of her hair back. "That can be changed, Kurosaki-kun, I can get any girl into girls as long as I set my mind to it. Just look over there, those girls simply can't keep their eyes off me..."

"Eh?" Negi finally snapped his attention from the tiny dino, as did Nekane, and they saw the girls Honsho was talking about. Immediately, Negi felt something was wrong, which really came as no huge surprise by this point, but continued being vaguely annoying and a reminder he was definitely lowering his guard too much here, with all the dinosaurs and Nekane and all.

The girls were, as a matter of fact, completely motionless, bringing Negi stark, fresh and dreaded memories of the universal timestop. Perched on Negi's shoulder, Chamo gasped, whipping his head around to realize it was not only that group of girls; basically all attendants as far as the eye went, other than Negi's small group, were frozen in place, doing whatever they had been doing instants ago. Even the baby reptiles in the containment units had grown as still as fossils.

By now even Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) had realized this was happening, and how uncommon it was. "Hrmmm?" she hummed. "Now what, is this some kind of staged prank? Like a flash mob?"

Orihime gulped, somehow sensing something foul ahead, and clutching the tense Ichigo's sleeve. "Kurosaki-kun? All of a sudden, I don't like this, I have this weird feeling in my tummy..."

"It might be a side effect of undergoing a time-space continuum alteration and becoming disjointed with your surrounding reality," the mentioned Chao Linghsen easily said, walking by and stopping close. "Or maybe you just ate some of the hot dogs sold by the entrance, that's why you should stick to your friends at the Chao Bao Zi...!"

Negi nodded. "Yes, that's right, I can vouch for... Chao-san!" he finally gasped as soon as the other shoe dropped, something that would have happened instantly on a semi-normal day. As things were today, however, it was a miracle the poor kid's mind kept on working at all. Most grown men would've been in a padded room by then. Or sent to Mahora to be a teacher. Hmm… "What, what are you doing here?!"

"Yo, Negi-bouzou," Chao waved, while Nekane squinted at her in instinctive distrust, and Inoue bowed to Chao and offered apologies over taking a bite somewhere else, as all Mahora students were prone to do when caught in the act. "Sorry 'bout this! I meant to talk to you and the enigmatic Black Rose Baron in private, but I kept on observing data of the likely outcomes from these developments and realized these four weren't leaving anytime soon, so we'll have to do this with them as our guest stars today-ne?"

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) blinked. "The what of fucking what, now?"

Chao hummed, deigning her with a semi-interested glance. "Hmmm, I can understand it in the cases of Kuchiki-san, Inoue-san and Kurosaki-san, but why are you still active, I wonder? I meant to leave you locked out as well. Maybe I underestimated you while running my area checkups for this iteration..."

Negi blinked, growing more concerned by the moment. "Chao-san? Have you been drinking? Again?" he asked the first question he was supposed to ask as a worried teacher listening to nonsense (even by Ala Alba standards) from one of his students.

Chao sighed. "No. No, Negi-bouzou, I haven't been drinking at all yet! The party's tonight!" But then she smirked. "So, how did you like my gift? Put it to good use yet?"

Negi gasped. "But of course! Cassiopeia! Then, you, too...!"

The Chinese girl giggled, patting on the bulge of one of the pockets in her shorts. "I always keep a prototype at hand for events like this, naturally! But yours is the finished model, of course. Only the best for my Negi-bouzou..."

"I feel like I've just wandered into Episode Forty One of a Ninety Three Episode TV series," Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) decided.

"Oh, so you want an explanation!" Chao smiled smugly, perching her fists on her hips.

Rukia, Ichigo, Inoue, Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba), and Nekane all nodded. So did Kojiro and Martha, who also remained active but hanging around while invisible.

Negi flinched. "Chao-san, perhaps this isn't a good idea, whatever is going on. I mean, usually no one has better ideas than you, but—!"

"I'm a Martian super-cute duper-genius from the future, and also Negi-bouzou's descendant, and I'm going to reveal the existence of magic to the whole world! Isn't that the most awesome thing ever?!" Chao flashed a huge, starkly white grin to all present.

Chamo fell off Negi's shoulder with a half-ecstatic, half-despairing gasp. Ecstatic because that meant his Aniki would actually get laid someday (Chamo was starting to wonder) and despairing because, despite of his initial reservations, dammit, he was hoping to pull this girl in too someday.

Negi's whole face grew hideously pale, then briefly contracted unto itself, as if collapsing into a tiny hole right at the middle of it. _J-Just like the other Chao-san!_

Nekane just broke into a mad fit of choked coughing, putting a hand to her throat and rasping in place.

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) only snorted. "Eh. This class and their weird performances just get weirder and more absurd by the year, I swear! And you aren't even naked this time..."

Chao shrugged. "That could be fixed, but not right now, please. I'm with my family, for Kami's sake!"

Chizuru blinked (Honsho, not Naba). "W-wait, really?-! S-seriously? Y-you're not justing trolling an innocent maiden's heart, are you?-!"

Orihime blinked, then slammed a fist into a palm as her face brightened up into a large smile. "Ah, of course! That makes perfect sense and explains so much I've always wondered about 3-A! Almost all of it, actually!"

The deeply weirded out Rukia and Ichigo stared at her, as did the Servants.

Orihime sighed. "Of course, it still doesn't answer anything about the girl with red eyes and white hair, but maybe Chao-san knows something about her, too?"

"Gherk," Ichigo and Rukia gurgled as one, with large sweatdrops on their heads.

"Which one?" Negi said, too shocked by the revelation to stop his helpful British manners from hijacking his mouth. "There are a lot of girl with red eyes and white hair running around… "

* * *

The woman Fujimaru-sempai had just summoned was very beautiful, Chisame had to admit. More beautiful than Kiyohime in Chisame's opinion, not that she wouldn't cosplay as both as soon as they left for their world anyway. Chisame also was slightly impressed by how the tail, the ears and the hair matched the foxgirl costume they'd put on Negi days ago so closely. Since Chisame herself had designed it, while asking Kasuga and Cocone to pass it off as their own design or else, the hacker was torn between feeling proud of her instincts or annoyed at the possibility of having developed some weird interdimensional sixth sense. Did you catch one of those if you hung long enough around cross dimensional weirdos? ARGH!

The newly arrived young woman- not a _girl_ , even if she still looked very young, but she was obviously no teenager anymore, and she looked fairly more developed than Kiyohime, Mordred or Marie- was wearing a daring blue bikini and wide summer hat, and seemed to be hugging thin air with her eyes closed and a kittenish smirk on her face before blinking in surprise. Looking around wildly, her gaze soon met Ritsuka's, and she gasped. "Ah, ah, Master! It's, ah, great to see you've summoned me back at last!" Then she frowned, staring at Mashu, Marie, Scathach, and the smugly smirking Kiyohime and Mordred (one assumed, since the helmet was still up. They radiated 'smirk' at radioactive, 'glow-in-the-dark' levels though). "Even if I wasn't your first choice, apparently!"

"Sorry," Ritsuka sighed. "Lots of thing happened."

"Including lots of encounters, no doubt," Tamamo squinted in distrust at the others present, and only recognizing the stoic local Saber and the growling Heracles as fellow Servants. Since she hadn't been a part of the party tackling Okeanos, she didn't register the latter as that much of a threat yet, the poor fool. "Okay, no way all of you are Masters, so what's the story here? And of course we'd find another Artoria-san right off the bat, too, you girls are everywhere... So, you an Archer?" she asked, staring at the watergun still in Saber's hand.

"I'm a Saber!" Artoria protested. "Why would my Class change just because I have put on a bathing suit?"

Scathach nodded. "Yes, you would need a swimsuit and the correct set of runes for that."

Ritsuka took a deep breath in. "Tamamo, these are Emiya Shirou-san and Illyasviel von Einzbern-chan, Masters in the local Grail War currently going on."

Tamamo snapped her fingers at the first two locals her Master had just introduced. "Mikon! Of course, you must be this world's version of the Master Artoria Alter-san lost! And you, you look just like Dress of Heaven, but smaller!" she giggled, reaching over to pat the frowning Illya's head, ignoring Heracles' latest threatening growl. "That makes sense, they came from alternate Fuyukis, and this Mahora is supposed to be very close to Fuyuki, right?"

Shirou nodded. "Yeah, but here... well, Fuyuki City was destroyed ten years ago. Looks like its fate is always going up in flames, huh?" he sighed, also wondering about this Dress of Heaven apparently related to Illya-chan. He could see the little girl was even more interested, but she was obviously biting back her tongue from asking yet, clearly still distrustful of this new Caster. Well, technically she was the first Caster either of them had ever met, and Saber had mentioned you never could be too careful around Casters even if they were so weak a Master could kick their ass, so he supposed her reaction made sense from her perspective. "Listen, these are our friends, we've heard the basics about your mission and we want to help. That's Illya-chan's maid Sayoko-san, and those are my... clubmates Hasegawa Chisame-san and Tsunetsuki Matoi-san. That's Eva McDowell-sama, she's scary, don't mess with her, and the girls staring at each other over her are Chachamaru-san and... Kallen-san, right?"

"Karin," the black haired girl growled, still staring at and being stared at by the just as cold behaving gynoid.

"Right, sorry," Shirou said. "Finally, these are my friend Yuuki Rito-san, his fiancee Lala Hime-sama, and her sister Momo-chan and Nana-chan."

"Hiiiiiiii!-!" Lala waved happily.

"Oh ho ho," Momo laughed demurely, the hand on her mouth trying to be prim as well as saucy, "it's a real pleasure meeting you in the flesh, Caster-san. You are even more beautiful than I had imagined..."

Nana only mumbled. "Why does Onee-san get a 'Hime-sama' and we only get '-chans'?" Thus proving she'd quickly grown used to Japanese honoriffics as a whole.

Caster took on all of this with a thoughtful, wary silence before smiling widely, a smile that made hearts feel better and lighter by just looking at it, the poor fools. "Pleased to meet you all, then! Any new friends of my husband are eternal friends of mine, after all."

" _Your_ husband?" Kiyohime commented with a malicious smile, while Ritsuka sweated copiously and Mashu approached Chisame, whispering for her to go get her something from downstairs.

Tamamo frowned at her rival. "Yes, my husband, just like always, must we go through this every time? Oh, by the way, Master! I've located a few local Masters and Servants already! I met the woman claiming to be this War's Caster!"

"Seriously?!" Artoria perked up, greatly interested.

"Was she," Tsunetsuki asked, recalling Kuro's briefing in Kyoto, "a very beautiful woman with purple hair and elvish ears, hiding under a heavy cloak?"

Tamamo blinked. "You knew her already?"

Matoi shrugged. "Not personally, but you could say I've heard of her."

Caster huffed. "Okayyyy... Anyway, Master, I also found this world's counterpart of my Master in the Moon Cell Grail War!"

Artoria gasped. "Stop yourself a moment there, Caster! Are you saying you do fighting a war previous to the one you're living through right now? That is impossible!"

"You remember the Fourth War," Shirou reminded her.

Saber hissed. "I've told you, that is a special case! But hers-!"

"Mine's a special case as well, I'm no ordinary Servant!" Caster tossed her long hair back haughtily. "I'm a Divine Spirit, the Throne of Heroes cannot alter or delete my memories! And I'd never forget the face and name of Kishinami Hakuno!"

"Well, that's good to know!" Kiyohime ufu-fu-fu'ed. "So that's who you were hugging before coming here to claim absolute loyalty to MY husband...!"

Caster blinked. "Um, well, now wait just a second, Kiyo-chan! I won't deny I hugged her, but that was just a perfectly friendly and chaste embrace, and it doesn't count between girls, and I used no tongue, and right now my husband is the only one I-!"

"MY husband!-!" Kiyohime growled, pulling her Pactio card out and almost shoving it on Caster's face.

Being unused to Western magic, Tamamo blinked, understanding no more than Tamamo Cat would have. "And this is...? What, are you trying to be a Caster like me too? Silly wet tissue Berserker."

Kiyohime sneered and opened her mouth.

Ritsuka turned to Artoria. "Saber-san, please remember your oath..."

 _ **"YOU'RE SAYING YOU DID WHAT?!-?!"**_ Tamamo-no-Mae was exploding with fury a second later.

"Please do it now!" Ritsuka desperately begged of Artoria.

Karin was momentarily distracted from her stare-off with Chachamaru. "Why are people in this day and age so noisy?"

"Blame something called television," Eva muttered bitterly, looking at the two former friends going at each other's throats, "although I doubt that is related to the specific case of those two hags..."

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

"Okay, infodump time now, neh?" Chao asked happily, pulling out a small device that looked like an electronic laser pointer. "Negi-bouzou, Chamo-san, sorry I can't show you something as elaborate as Kuro-chan's Kyoto display, but I'm running on a budget here, see?"

Negi nodded, still half-hazed and stunned. "That's… That's okay, I understand!" he gulped, sweating visibly.

Honsho frowned. "Are you talking to the ermine too?"

"Aren't you rich?" Rukia said.

Chao pressed a pink button on her device, and it flashed a large, elaborate holographic display of Earth and Mars' orbits, hovering over everyone's heads. Orihime cooed in cute awe. "Ohhhh! As expected from the Great Genius of Mahora…!"

" _That's_ a budget presentation?" Ichigo cried. "By whose standards, Richie Rich's?"

Chao nodded, plenty satisfied. "A-yep! I can see you'll understand this just fine, Orihime-Sempai. These are the not quite twins but still sibling worlds of Vetus and Magicus, linked together by the power of magic, an uncommon power on Earth, but still necessary for Magicus' survival."

Negi frowned. "Are you a follower on the Atlas Institute's theories on the so-called 'death of magic', Chao-san? I'd like to remind you even Doctor Strange wrote a thesis on how that is impossible, magic never disappears, it just transmutates…"

Chao waved a hand in an easygoing way. "Oi, oi, Negi-bouzou! Magic is indestructible, I should know, but the numbers of those who can use it in this world are becoming increasingly rare, you can't deny that. Mankind is losing their connection to the arcane forces as we move into the eras of technology, and magic usage is lost from the public knowledge. Just look at poor Honsho-sempai, her face is the best example of how alien these concepts have become. Literally alien, in my case. Heh!"

Honsho frowned. "Was that some kind of stealth insult?"

"Wouldn't dream of it," Chao said. "Anyway, while you are all familiar with Vetus, better known as Earth, being your world of origin in all cases but one…"

"Kurosaki-kun's, right?" Inoue asked, while casually poking a thumb towards Ichigo. Both he and Rukia did a saliva spit-take.

"That's right…!" a contented Chao nodded. "Again, you keep up with this admirably well, Sempai!"

Orihime shrugged with a small smile. "Well, he's the mysterious mid-term student exchange, so if any of us was an alien, it had to be him! It was hardly difficult to figure out. What other options were there? Rukia unknowingly being from another world? Chizuru-chan being a space alien like Superman-sama?"

Chizuru (Honsho, not Naba) sweatdropped. "That… T-That actually makes sense of sorts, but even so, please don't say it so lightly, Hime-chan…! And w-why am I the alien in this example? T-That's silly, don't you think?"

"Right," Chao said, "so anyway I don't come from Earth like you do, I hail from Mundus Magicus, the much younger artificial magic-infused world created on the Martian surface by a godlike entity." Here the image in the hologram changed to that of a tall, mysterious hooded figure, with a question mark blocking the facial shadows under their cloak. "I'm a Martian from the Red Planet! But sadly, as our world's structure is completely reliant on magic and our creator was sealed away long ago, in the future Mundus Magicus will collapse on itself! Poof, and goodbye to all mermaids, talking unicorns, Guilds of Mages, highly fetishistic catgirl waitresses, and other creatures of myth and legend!"

"That's terrible!" Orihime gasped, taking a hand to her mouth.

Honsho grunted. "Hime-chan, you're just too gullible…"

"Ghosts will always remain," Ichigo observed, stone-faced. "Look, I'm not saying that's not a bad thing that will happen to your world, but your people will just pass into a higher plane of existence. That's part of the normal cycle of life and death, and must be accepted…"

"That's not all, though!" Chao said. "The survivors of my world, looking for refuge, will invade Earth, and that will lead to a decades-long all out war leaving hundreds of thousands of dead everywhere, yo!"

"That's also part of the cycle of life and death," Ichigo added, tone unchanged.

"You're a cold bastard!" Rukia accused.

Negi sighed. "Chao-san, your story sounds remarkably similar to that of the other Chao-san. We will be glad to help if we can, of course, but why didn't you just tell us this back then?"

"There's another one like her?" Honsho pointed at Chao. "What, your class didn't have enough with one set of twins? Hmm, kinky loli twins…"

"None of you ever asked," Chao told Negi. "Seriously, there was the slightest chance YOUR world would also suffer through that in the future, and you never saw fit to ask whether it'd come to pass here too? What the hell, heroes, yo?"

Negi pondered that in a shocked silence before sheepishly admitting. "I guess the mere idea was just so dire, none of us wanted to even think of it…?"

"Besides," Ichigo said, "if I'm understanding this right, you should have said so first, right? Technically, it'd be YOUR world on the line before this one!"

"You probably aren't understanding it right," Honsho snarked, defending the girl. Hey, White Knighting was a tried and true (and never worked, but that's beside the point) method of triyng to score points with chicks!

"Negi-bouzou's club was under a lot of pressure at the time," Chao argued. "I couldn't possibly burden them with this knowledge while also having to rescue Konoka-san from demon-controlling terrorists, ne?"

Negi sighed again. "Sorry to tell you this, but I'm afraid we have our hands just as full, if not more so, right now…"

Orihime blinked. "Sounds like you had a cool class trip! Lucky you, we only got to see some ruins and some kid from another school disappeared never to be seen again… Anyway, why didn't you contact Kurosaki-kun instead, then? You're from the same world after all!"

"I said," Chao pointed out, "we didn't come from this world, not that we came from the same different world. We aren't to blame for Strawberry-sempai here."

"That's my line!" Ichigo huffed. "You… You Martian, do you think I don't know about you guys? You still keep slaves, and gladiator battles to the death, and are always warring against each other, so don't start acting as if you're any better than Soul Society!"

"So basically, those John Carter books are right, Kurosaki-kun?" Orihime blinked.

"What's a Soul Society, now?" Chizuru sighed wearily. "I swear, every so called answer only brings more questions, this must be what they call a Kudzu plot…"

"Or a CW show," Rukia suggested, head equally aching.

"Listen, Sempai," Chao threw her hands in front of Ichigo. "Let's not start arguing on who's better, Mundus Magicus or Soul Society. Mainly because you'd lose every time, but also because we don't have the time for it. I've seen the future! Come with me if you don't want to die, yo! Save the cheerleader, save the world! In other worlds, I hold valuable info you need to save your futures and you should do what I say, do you understand now?"

Negi gasped. "Then, Misa, Sakurako and Madoka are important for mankind as a whole?!"

"Ah, I think the bit about the cheerleader was just a pop culture reference, Sensei," Chizuru said. "Haven't you ever watched Heroes?"

Negi shook his head. "The title has its appeal, but my sister and Chisame told me it was a bad show, so I skipped it…"

Nekane, who so far had remained silent only learning and trying to assimilate, flinched slightly, although she still was glad Negi had followed on her advice during his stay at Japan.

"And you're Negi-sensei's descendant on top of everything else," Rukia evenly told Chao.

Chao nodded. "Yup!"

"Okay, so let's play along," Kuchiki continued. "And you came from our future…"

"By using my pocket watch shaped time machine that lets me travel through time and relative distance in space, yo!" Chao peppily explained.

Rukia massaged the popping veins on her own forehead. "Right… And then you know who will Negi-sensei marry in the future, right?"

"Assuming he ever marries," Chao said.

Nekane jumped in irate protest while Negi wobbled in place. "Are you implying he would have children out of wedlock, ever?! I raised, I mean, he was raised better than that, I'm sure!"

"You're his older sister, aren't you?" Rukia asked the blonde.

"I'M NOT! I'M A MAN!"

Chao shrugged. "I'm not saying he will or won't, I'm just saying the chance is always there. I think, however, you truly meant who was the woman he will procreate with to spawn my bloodline, which is an altogether different question. Well, I can tell you that. I thought of leaving it as a surprise so I'd have an ace in my sleeve, a family tree to throw around in cases of need, but I suppose that joke's kind of overplayed by now, ne…?"

"You lost me," Ichigo confessed in his best, and admirably well done, Shirou impression.

Nekane hyperventilated while Negi broke into panic. "You, you truly meant it, you deranged strange girl, you…?!"

Chizuru yawned. "It's the neurotic wet blanket always hanging over him like a hawk, right? Honestly, that's just so predictable…"

"It's always the one you would suspect the least, so I'm sure that's Shirai Kuroko-san," Orihime opined.

"Actually, it's you," Chao told her.

Ichigo hummed deeply. "Well, if I have to, I'll place a bet on that Vice President girl, the one who's really loud and is always telling me to stop bleaching like a delinquent even though it's not Bleach. What was her name, again? She's really annoying and Ishida said she has a thing for Sensei and—wait, WHAT?!"

"Martians, much like these hips, don't lie, yo," Chao explained to Ichigo and the stone statues of Negi, Nekane, Chamo, Honsho, Orihime and Rukia, while doing a quick Shakira-esque wiggle of hips.

Ichigo blinked, then reached over to gently knocks on the heads of the stone statues. "It looks like they're out of action forever, thank you very much. Just tell me what I must do and I'll see if I can be the hero this time…"

"You wish!" Chao told him. "You said it yourself, this isn't Bleach!"

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

After leaving a few of Setsuna's paper dolls covering for them, a gathering of Negi's Ministra Magi- Ayaka, Yuuna, Sora, Misa, Madoka, Sakurako, Setsuna and Konoka- had come together in the small breakroom they'd desginated for changing clothes and such to discuss the matter of one Tomoe Mami, involuntary interloper. Cocone and Misora remained at the front door, Haruna, Asuna and Hakase were still out contacting Nodoka and Yue, Haruka was still meeting with the Honnouji Occult Club, and Chisame still was at the rooftop with Matoi and the core of the Chaldea party.

"And that's not all," Yuuna finished her report while worrying about Iinchou's blood pressure. The current color on her normally very fair face and the way her eyebrows were twitching definitely were not normal or healthy at all. Still, what came next couldn't be left unsaid. "I think the cat's outta the bag when it comes to Natsumi, too. After the whole Joker reveal, well, she pretty much figured the basics out on her own, and then-"

"That's fine," Ayaka icily said. "I wouldn't ever dream of hurting Murakami-san or Tomoe-san for stumbling into this, anyway. You and Morisato-sempai, of course, may be another matter entirely, Akashi-san," she tensely warned Yuuna.

"Isn't that bullying?" Yuuna said.

"Only if the teachers find out, and lets face it, how often do they find out about anything we do anymore?" Ayaka said. "We haven't seen Itoshiki-sensei in forever, and he's supposed to be in the building!"

"For whatever it's worth, I'm thankful to all of you for my safety," Mami politely said. "You've been all very kind to me, considering... the circumstances."

"You're welcome, Tomoe-san," Sora bowed to her just as politely.

"If the Joker's actually here, then Tsukuyomi must be with him," Setsuna grimly said. "No doubt she's coming after me as we speak. Ojou-sama, even if we cannot alert the Headmaster, we should ship you over to Eishun-sama's home on the double while we deal with this."

"Unless that's what the psycho girl who knows you better than anyone expects you to do, and she's preparing to act on it, I guess?" Sakurako hummed, with a finger in her mouth.

Setsuna flinched visibly while Konoka hummed at Sakurako. "That's a moot point anyway, Saku-chan, I'm not leaving Setchan's side no matter what! I'm not scared of Tsuki-chan, either! In the end she's more bark than bite!"

"Konoka, she has so much bite, it doesn't matter how much bark she has," Misa said. "You're going to get stabbed anyway."

"Enough," Ayaka grumbled, reaching in for her Pactio card. "Before we discuss this course of action any further, we must consult with Negi-sensei first. As the highest ranking member present, I will-"

"Um, I tried that already, but that Temptress chick's somehow messing communications," Yuuna warned. "Bitch better not be running up the bill on my phone… "

"Nonsense, the Power of my Love will prevail!" Ayaka proclaimed, placing the card against her forehead and then asking, "Hello, Sensei? Senseiiii? Are you there, Negi-sensei...?"

Mami took this chance to ask Yuuna, "So, um, this Tsukuyomi-san who has you just as worried as the Joker would be-?"

"Setsuna's psycho lesbian half-sister, who is just as good with a sword as she is, maybe better, and Setsuna's as good as they come," Yuuna summed up.

"Nonsense, Tsuki-chan's nowhere as good as Setchan!" Konoka disagreed. "It's not that she's bad at all, well, unless we are talking about morals and ethics, but-"

"Ah! Negi-sensei!" Ayaka suddenly brightened up. "See, I knew I could do it! Akashi-san said Pactio links were failing, but-!"

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

The just -revived Negi sighed as he stood aside, Chao still explaining a few things over to Ichigo, the rest of the team still mostly reduced to wide eyed catatonia, effectively as paralyzed as those within the short range timestop effect. He'd just come back to his senses when he felt his student's call, urging him back to wakefulness despite everything. Even so, he remained in hardly the best of moods at the time.

"Iinchou, while I'm relieved beyond measure to hear you're okay, could you please make this short?" the boy teacher pleaded. "I'm here with Black Rose Baron-san and Chao-san, and things have grown... somewhat hectic, so we have a few matters to settle before we can tackle anything else..."

 _Including the subject of the Joker and Tsukuyomi-san?_ Ayaka's voice asked dubiously through their link.

Negi paused, then warily asked, "So... They **are** here, after all? It's confirmed now?"

 _It's what Akashi-san is saying_ , Ayaka reported. _On her way here, she also ran into Tomoe Mami-san, who was being attacked by what seemed to be a new breed of Orphan, so she brought her here. What do you think we should do about her, Sensei?_

Negi exhaled wearily. "Just keep her close and make sure she's safe, please. If Orphans were willing to go directly after her in the open, in broad daylight, there must be a good reason for it. I can't explain too much right now, but someone's apparently controlling all Orphans in the campus, someone related to the Grail War..."

Then he felt a shadow looming over him, and he tilted his eyes up, looking at the large shadowy figure perched on the ceiling's rafters, staring down at them with icy piercing eyes. Chao looked up as well and waved at this newly arrived masked visitor, while Ichigo only groaned and hoped he wasn't there to discuss the matter of his parents. That could easily become an uncomfortable topic, after all. "Look, Iinchou," Negi said, "I think we actually might be lucky concerning the Joker, the biggest expert on the topic's just arrived..."

 _Are you sure that's not a cosplayer, Sensei?_ Ayaka asked.

"Quite," Negi said, then raised his voice a little to ask the Bat, "Batman-sama? How did you get pass Chao-san's-"

The Batman held a small golden device shaped like a bug and growled, "Someone calling himself Booster Gold once gave me this, and warned me to never come to Mahora without it..."

"Ah, of course," Chao smiled. "Booster-san, naturally! It's been a while. Heh, well, it can't be helped, he comes from far further than I do, doesn't mean he's any smarter than me or anything. So how have you been doing, Batman-sama?"

The big dark figure dropped to his booted feet right next to Negi, giving her a sharp, questioning glare before telling the boy, "Scarecrow's not at home. We need to start looking for him **and** the Joker in any and all places where massive amounts of nerve gas could be spread across the campus."

"You've been listening to pretty much everything, haven't you?" Negi guessed, lowering Ayaka's card at last, his face flat and pretty much lifeless.

Batman nodded before telling him, "You know, as soon as we have sorted this out, you should start enjoying your youth a bit more. Otherwise you'll become a self-destructive, obsessed loner. And that's not something I'd wish happening to anyone else."

"Well, I was trying to work at that with Ne- with Black Rose Baron-san," Negi explained, rolling his eyes aside, "but sometimes it just doesn't work like that, right? I'm not sure I ever would want to expose Orihime-san to this kind of life, actually..."

"I'm sure she can take it," Chao shrugged.

"You really sure?" Ichigo took a moment to tap his knuckles on the head of the Inoue statue.

"Well, after enough character development, at least," Chao admitted.

"I always suspected," the Batman told her, "there was something very wrong with you."

"Why?" Chao asked. "Because I was officially a rich orphan with several martial arts belts, half a dozen equivalent doctorates, a body that won't quit and stunning good looks?"

"No, because you are all of that **and** you can cook," replied Bruce Wayne, who couldn't even boil noodles without his butler's help. Brian Azzarello stories don't count, shut up.

"Listen, before we take this any further," Ichigo sighed, "let me tell you I didn't work on your parents' case, so don't bother asking me where they-"

"Who are you?" Batman asked him.

Ichigo blinked, rather surprised at not being recognized by this man who could apparently recognize anyone who was someone right while meeting them for the first time, before begrudgingly explaining, "I'm a Shinigami, a Spirit of Death guiding souls to the afterlife..."

Negi tensed up. "My father's still alive, isn't he? I mean, I've heard from others that he is, but I'd like for a third op-"

Ichigo threw his hands up. "Yeah, yeah, he is as far as I know! The Thousand Master, right? Alive! Definitely alive, last time I checked, but where, no idea, that's not my department either!"

Negi blinked. "Um, why, thank you! And... my mother...?" he shyly asked.

Chao blinked as well. "Oh. _Now_ you worry about Grandmother?"

Negi shrugged. "As good a time to start as any other, don't you think?"

"... that depends, I suppose," Ichigo said after a moment of pause. "Maybe we should leave this for later? I mean, it's a long subject to explain, and I'm not even sure I've got the clearance to discuss it with you, and-"

"Okay, okay, I understand," Negi reasonably said. "Don't sweat it over, I'm thankful all the same. So, sort-of-dead only, huh? That's still better than outright dead, I imagine..."

"So much for starting to worry about Grandmother," Chao sighed. "What if she's a zombie? Don't you think that's a fate worse than death?"

Negi gasped, then asked Ichigo, "Is she a zombie?!"

Ichigo sweatdropped. "Ahhhhh... nooooo. Not a zombie at all."

Negi smiled. "Then I don't feel worried at all! Well, other than about leaving Chisame behind... and about having children with Orihime-san... and about the Joker... and the Scarecrow... and Tsukuyomi-san... and my father... and this Grand Caster Fujimaru-san mentioned... and..."

"Yes, as soon as this is over, your club **must** take you away on a vacation," Batman sternly decided.

"Those things are cursed," Ichigo warned.

"He's a middle school teacher, he wouldn't notice," Batman said.

* * *

 _The fucking rooftop:_

"Go, go, Kiyohime-sama!" Matoi cheered while Mashu pondered kicking her aside, currently still doing her best to keep Tsunetsuki and all the other squishy people behind her shield, even if it meant literally kicking Emiya-san back whenever he tried to rush into the battle. "Stomp your rival down! No mercy, woo! Woo!"

So far they were either showing some restrain or, more likely, keeping it real personal by duking it out up close and face to face without pulling the Noble Phantasms out yet. That was giving Kiyohime more of an early advantage, being more physical than Tamamo, but the fox was showing unusual levels of raw pent up physical aggression this time, making her able to keep up with the Berserker for the most part. They moved quickly across the rooftop, forcing Shielder to keep turning Lord Camelot to new angles to keep everyone as safe as she could. Not that Heracles needed any help on his side, keeping the laughing Illya sitting on his back and well above the immediate reach of the fighting Servants.

"Give it up already!" Kiyohime snarled, resorting to the not very elegant but always practical tactic of grabbing the adversary's hair to tug her around. "What is done is done, and I kissed Anchin-sama first!"

"Fourth!" Mordred shouted, staying back only out of a wish to see the two annoyances kill each other.

"F-Fourth?!" Tamamo briefly snapped to shocked horror, allowing Kiyohime a free kick to her solar plexus. "LANCER!"

Scatach sighed. "Why does everyone always assume I'm in this? Because I am the sexiest around?"

"Because you're a daughter-fucking slut!" Kiyohime and Tamamo both chorused, momentarily pausing to glare at her, before going right back to trying to beat each other up.

Shishou sniffed. "Well, it kept her out of trouble."

"Argh, the betrayal, the bloody betrayal!" Tamamo lamented, lashing out and slashing at Kiyohime's face, forcing her back. "I see I made a mistake! I shouldn't have just wiped the Japanese army off, but sank the whole country...!"

Emiya looked at the pale, limp Ritsuka. "And you were saying you were the good guys, right?"

"Then again, we all take orders from Eva-sama, do we have any right to judge?" Matoi asked in turn.

Eva nodded. "I thought we had all settled I was trying to make mid-bosses of evil out of the whole lot of you, already."

Karin stared coldly at her. "You are the worst."

"It takes one to recognize another," Chachamaru said, just as coldly. She'd made up her mind by now, as soon as Chisame-san returned she'd fly her out of there, go look for Negi-sensei, and leave the rest of these people to sort this out. She felt kind of bad about Emiya-sempai, but she trusted enough on Artoria-san, so...

"A fox like you has no understanding of human values!" growled the _dragon_ girl while madly pushing through Tamamo's defenses, retaliating with a slap and then a punt to the midsection. "You only vomit nonsense! Clueless club, playing to be in love with love!"

"I am the perfect wife and temptress, what are you?!" Tamamo demanded, grabbing Kiyohime by an arm and slamming her down. "The perfect stalker, that's all! Only an ugly annoyance trailing behind any Master showing you the most basic kindness!"

"It's not stalking, it's DEEP LOVING, you animal!" Matoi protested. "Let go of Kiyohime-sama!" she said before Marie was forced to restrain her from behind, kicking and swinging her fists.

Kiyohime kicked Caster back and off herself. "You would criticize me on being easily seduced? What a joke! You, who just admitted to still being in love with a Master from a prior life!" she pointed with her fan at the seething Tamamo, accusingly. "For shame! Next you'll have the courage to call Anchin-sama a polygamist, when you would have him as part of your collection of shameless conquests!"

"The rules are different for those of divine heritage and it doesn't count when it's between two girls!" Tamamo barked, greatly reminding Eva, Matoi and Rito of Skuld for a moment. "And speaking of that, I see it's time to prove how different we are! We never should have been pen pals! That false friendship matters nothing now, for the Moon can't be friends with a pebble anymore than I can be friends with the likes of you!"

Then she rattled and jerked, her tail stiffening and then splitting into four different tails of burning light, while the Caster's eyes grew engulfed by a red glow, her fangs bared and growing ominously bigger.

"Ooooo! Interesting!" Illya cooed and clapped.

Ritsuka finally reacted in horror past his stupor. "Caster, no! Don't use four tails for something like this!"

Kiyohime sighed with a dignified air of grim finality. "So it cannot be helped, huh," she said. "Please forgive me, Anchin-sama. I may not be able to come back from this..."

"You too, Kiyohime?!" Ritsuka demanded.

"So you name IS Anchin?" Rito said. "Okay, never mind, I'm just calling you Anchin from now on, new guy."

The Berserker loosened her kimono. "Please stay loyal to your wife after this, but if you absolutely feel the need to remarry after becoming a widower, please select Marie Hime-sama over the other bitches..."

"What did I ever do to you?!" Mashu gasped.

Mordred grunted, looking aside. "Whatever, the needs of a corpse are forgotten just as soon as the last breath passes. Just hurry up and die!"

Marie blinked. "Um, thank you very much, Madame Kiyo?"

Caster roared madly, while Lala and Nana shared gasps of great, fascinated interest with Illya, and pretty much everyone else rushed back for further cover, Artoria dragging Shirou behind her. The fox courtesan moved forward on all fours like an idiot ninja protagonist using a self-destructive power-up that doesn't actually hurt him because he has plot armor while Kiyohime's eyes gained serpent-like, slitted pupils, the Berserker hissing inhumanly. "This is a marriage battle. That means I cannot, and will not, lose, ever! Noble Phantasm! Four Headed Serpent, Flameshift Samadhi!-!"

"Kiyohime-sama, noooooooo!" Matoi desperately pleaded, while a gigantic figure armed with four large snake heads appeared, towering all over and around Kiyohime, and then lunging ahead for the incoming, crazedly rushing Tamamo...

* * *

Down below, laying on her back while Mio worked her magic on top of her, Risa could get a glimpse of this over her oblivious... friend's shoulder, too, but like hell she was going to bother to point it out this time.

* * *

"Ah, finally!" Mashu said as Chisame rushed back onto the rooftop, throwing the item Shielder had requested for earlier at her. The Servant of the Shield easily caught it in the air, rolled the item up into a compact, hard hitting format, and then jumped forward fearlessly, despite of Marie and Ritsuka's cries of warning.

The brave young Demi Servant, protecting herself with her shield, quickly made it between the rivals, bashing Kiyohime's snakes back with Lord Camelot, as her other arm swung in the opposite direction...

... and whacked Tamamo-no-Mae across the nose with the rolled up magazine Chisame had tossed her way.

The visibly struck and surprised Caster hopped back, putting a hand to her face, while Kiyohime and her snakes reeled back from the violent clash against the unbreakable barrier. Caster tried to growl a few not so nice things at Shielder then, but was silenced before she could with another magazine impact to the nose, to which she reacted whimpering like a chastised dog.

"Bad Caster! Bad, bad girl!" Mashu chided her, with the stern, relentless tone of a strict canine trainer. "You know you mustn't act like this! For shame, Caster!"

"But I'm not only a fox, I'm also a woman in-!" Caster protested before Shielder now bopped her on the head.

"Quiet and down! Quiet and down!" Mashu commanded. "Do we really need to have you neutered, now? You know Da Vinci-san won't back away from it, if she has to! So behave now, and be a good girl! You too, Kiyohime-san!"

The female Berserker hissed poisonously. "Are you out of your mind, child? I'm no stray mutt like this-"

"Shaddap, I said!" Mashu insisted, whacking one of the snake heads in the mouth and sending them retreating for cover behind Kiyohime's back, making the Berserker sigh and shake her head.

Nana clapped lightly. "Bra-vo! What an impressive display of animal training, I'm impressed!"

Mashu smiled apologetically, with a small blush. "W-Well, I'm just following the standard Chaldea Procedure for Troublesome Servants, you know... The real merit goes to Da Vinci-san, she was the one to think of all the protocols herself..."

"Oh, so she's like Batman-sama that way, then," Matoi guessed.

"Like who?" Karin blinked.

"Never mind," Matoi replied. "By the way, the thanks belong to Chisame-sama, since she bravely made her way back here when she could have just left, all for me..."

"I did it for Maid-san, actually," Chisame blandly pointed at Sayoko. "I was tempted to just run for it, but I couldn't abandon someone who has suffered enough as to be Illya's domestic help."

"You must be a real joy to have as a sister-in-law, you know?" Illya sneered with contempt at her.

"There, there..." a moved Ritsuka sympathetically said, reaching over to cautiously pat the heads of Tamamo and Kiyohime, as they crouched down by his sides, each sobbing and crying like whipped puppies. "Mashu, maybe you just went a wee bit too far...? I mean, this could count as animal abuse!"

"Oh, don't worry," Chisame said. "Here in Mahora, you can get away with that kind of abuse all the freaking time. It's kind of therapeutic, actually."

Nana looked at Illya. "Looks like we've just found a common enemy."

"I know, right?" Illya shrugged. "What do boys see in her type, anyway? I never cease to wonder..."

* * *

 _Dinosaur Land:_

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

"Anyway, let's make this quick, since obviously there are more... urgent problems to handle," Nekane said through gritted teeth, staring down at the confidently smiling Chao. She still refused to believe they could be related, even if that smile DID remind Nekane of Uncle's. "What do you hope to gain by revealing all this nonsense to us?"

"It's not nonsense, I've told you already, Martians never lie!" Chao said, with a hand on her heart. "And I want you to help me with this noble task of revealing magic to the world, of course!"

"Never!" Nekane quickly replied. "We'd never dream of breaking the ultimate taboo of magic!"

"I thought that was admitting to being responsible for JK Rowling?" Negi said.

"The OTHER ultimate taboo of magic," Nekane said.

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

Chao chuckled smugly. "Hu hu hu, are those the words of a law breaking mysterious phantom thief, or those of an aunt raised in the countryside? I always mix those two up, somehow..."

"See, you're lying already! Again!" Nekane pointed out. "I'm nobody's aunt, and certainly not yours! I'm a man!"

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

"Not yet, anyway," Chao shrugged. Whether this was said as an answer to Nekane or Honsho, or both, was left unclear. "But I agree we should debate this later, after these villains you speak of have been found and caught. Their presence here is obviously harmful to my own evil schemes, after all, so my forces will do their best to help you... in their own way!"

Negi blinked. "'Your forces'? My God, Chao-san, how many co-conspirators have you dragged into this?"

"Now, that would be spoiling the surprise, Negi-bouzou," his student told him. "And what's Batman-sama's take on this? Will the fabled Dark Knight of Gotham oppose or aid this cute but dangerous rogue?"

The Bat huffed. "That's a matter to be settled between mages, and it doesn't concern me at all. As soon as your plan harms any innocents, however, I will be there to stop you. Permanently."

"She just literally told us she's evil!" Nekane protested.

"I'm American. Have you seen our presidents?" Batman said.

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

The already recovered Orihime gently patted her on a shoulder. "Please get over it already, Chizuru-chan."

Chao giggled. "Oh, Phantom Thief Aunt, I think that, deep inside, Batman-sama agrees with me! For a man who hides behind a mask, I'm sure he's the type who despises global conspiracies to keep mankind in the dark, and would do everything in his power to unearth them himself, ne?"

"You have me confused with Reed Richards. It's not my place to say when humanity will be ready for that kind of knowledge," Batman tersely told her, "and I realize I can't really stop social change. Still, if you do succeed and your actions bring more harm than good to the world..."

Chao's expression turned suddenly very serious. "And yet you aren't telling me 'if your actions bring ANY harm at all', right? Booster-san did tell you a few things, didn't he. He knows what is to come. Even a goofball like him realizes what must be done. And now you too, even if you hate it."

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

"Would you like it better if **you** were the mother, instead?!" an annoyed Rukia asked her. Ichigo had just wandered aside to go quietly talk on the subject with the two otherwise undetected Heroic Spirits watching over the scene.

Honsho paused, open mouthed, and then squeaked helplessly, "Me and that kid, really?"

Batman stared down at Chao. It bothered him that, much like Clark, the Joker, Alfred and pretty much nobody else he knew, she wasn't flinching under The Stare. Maybe Booster **had** been right about her after all. "What makes you so sure I'd ever trust him, or you, on a subject like this?"

The still unfazed Chao rolled her eyes and folded her arms. "Please, the fact you aren't stopping me already, maybe? This Era's Greatest Detective, huh? That sounded far more impressive back at home!"

"Maybe I just don't think you'll be able to pull it off in the first place," Batman smirked harshly at her. If The Stare didn't work, maybe The Smirk would.

Chao answered with a Smirk of her own. The kid was damn good, there was no denying it. Even Clark could never answer The Smirk with another Smirk. Joker had to resort to The Grin, which was kind of cheating, and Alfred... well, Alfred just bopped Bruce over the head and told him to stop being childish already. "Well, we'll just have to wait and see then, ne?"

"Hime-chan and that kid, really?" Honsho squeaked helplessly.

"You know the more you repeat it, the more I grown used to the idea, right, Chizuru-chan?" Orihime mused innocently.

Negi and Honsho shuddered in fear instantly. Nekane only broke out into another violent fit of coughing.

"So, um," Chamo finally said. "Does all of this mean we've all entered a tacit agreement to sort this out later, or what? Because unless Busty Nee-san here wants a Pactio already, I think we should move on already to the matter of the mass murdering maniacs..."

"The little pet rat talks!" Orihime excitedly squealed.

Negi facepalmed. "Yes, Chamo. Yes, let's... let's just move on to the part where I risk my life, already."

* * *

 _Again, the rooftop:_

"There's only one thing that can be done now," Tamamo-no-Mae grimly announced.

Illya decided egging her for further amusement. "Let me guess! The only thing left for you is for your treacherous lover to kill himself!"

"Well, it is better to die by your own hand than through Polygamist Castration Fist," Ritsuka decided soberly. "Artoria-san, you promised?"

"Wow. I wonder what would happen if we introduced you to Itoshiki-sensei?" Matoi said.

"Polygamist Castration Fist?!" Rito gasped, crossing his legs tightly.

Ritsuka nodded. "It's just what it sounds like."

"Okay," Chisame said, "better not to ask where you've seen that... _thing_ in action. Although maybe I could benefit from learning it. Just a thought. I don't know. Just in case someday, somewhere, I would ever foolishly fall in love with some cheap Casanova who-"

Momo sighed. "Miss Chisame, please! Your Tsundere denial act is kinda pitiful to watch, really. And what manner of savage could ever hold a grudge against polyamory? Our everlasting civilization was built up on polyamory!"

"Good civilization or bad civilization?" Mordred said. At everyone's stares, she shrugged. "What? She's not here to ask the question."

Nana fidgeted awkwardly. "Ah, well, yeah, about that, maybe things are changing and we should adapt with them, Momo..."

"Nonsense!" Momo waved a hand. "We're going to help Lala, Rito-san and Haruna-san build the best harem Deviluke has ever known, aren't we?"

"I'm not having a harem!" Rito protested. It was close enough that Yue did not sneeze.

"I'm not a pitiful Tsundere in denial!" Chisame added.

"Well, you aren't pitiful at all, Chisame-sama, but there's no denying you're Tsundere," Matoi opined.

"Stop helping will you, Tsunetsuki?!"

"I just met you and I already can tell you are," Karin dryly said.

"Did we already have that term in the era I last saw you?" Evangeline wondered, somewhat intrigued.

Tamamo looked at all these disgusting strangers with scorn before slamming a foot down, hard enough to make everyone take notice. "No," she icily said. "After all, having my husband killed off before we could consummate our marriage would solve nothing, would it? Anyway, it's pointless to think a kiss equals a marriage. Everyone knows that!"

"Right, otherwise, Negi-sama would be a multiple bigamist, and every girl in his harem, Chisame-sama included, would be a minor molester as well," Matoi nodded.

"He doesn't have a harem!" Chisame growled.

 _Somewhere, Yue DID sneeze_.

"I hate to tell you this, but he does," Rito said.

"Oh, like you're one to talk!" Chisame told him.

"Look, I'm just a guy who has a girlfriend, has another girl after him that the girlfriend is for some reason okay with, and sometimes stumbles onto other girls," Rito reasoned. "Negi-sensei, on the other hand, has kissed like fifteen girls already, most of whom keep throwing themselves at him. I'm in a love polygon, but he's in a harem for real and there's no denying that!"

Shirou nodded. "That's solid enough reasoning."

"Indeed it is," his Servant agreed.

"Don't worry, Chisame-sama, I'll always love you even if you are a minor molesting sex offender," Matoi swore.

"What did I just tell you about not helping, Tsunetsuki?!"

Momo blinked. "Buuuut, Rito-san, what about me? I **am** after you, as well! That's why I sneak naked into your bed every night!"

Rito and Nana broke into a violent fit of choked coughing.

Evangeline rolled his eyes. "Isn't this just like this boy...? Always on his high horse so he can pretend he's not much more of a pervert than Boya..."

"Okay, I can't discuss that either," Emiya said. Again, Artoria nodded in agreement.

"What the hell, stop interrupting me with inane digressions, mikon!" Tamamo roared. "Can't you let people speak their piece without cutting them off by showing off how passive aggressive you are to each other?!"

"That's kinda what we do best, really," Matoi admitted.

"Anyway!" Tamamo said. "I refuse to admit defeat yet since a kiss proves nothing! Anyone can force or steal a kiss! That's no sign of a fulfilled marriage... that's what sex is for!"

Ritsuka looked aside shiftily.

"You're only saying that," Scathach pointed out, "because you weren't here to kiss Master first."

"That's besides the point...!" Caster threw her hands up. "Even so, the competition still goes on, and to compete on fair, equal grounds, I demand for a kiss and one of these 'alliances' as well!"

"Oh, what a huge surprise," Chisame deadpanned.

Mordred shrugged callously. "Eh, sure. Whatever. As long as it makes you stop whining already."

"I'm glad," Momo smiled, "you've finally realized polyamory is the true answer!"

"It's not, this isn't what this is about!" Tamamo hissed. "I'm just talking about the means to settle a controversy and set the stage for a single winner!"

"OBJECTION!" Kiyohime grandly pointed out. "I refuse to settle a matter that's already been settled! I already won, so there's no point on keeping a fair competition with someone who already, well, LOST! Accept defeat graciously for once, Tamamo-chan!"

"I still don't see how you can say you're the winner when I kissed Sempai before you did," Mashu mumbled to herself.

"What was that, Shielder-san?" the female Berserker growled.

"N-Nothing!"

"Oh, stop threatening her, she's a 4-Star, she'd kick your ass," Scathach said. "It's not like you're a 4-star limited edition swimsuit Lancer yet or anything, you're still wearing a kimono!"

"I'd like to remind everyone," Mordred said, "I kissed him before any of you, so if a kiss decides the victor, then-"

"That doesn't count! You're a man!" Kiyohime accused.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Artoria stepped ahead. "My son still can claim the right of those who were there first! You cannot bend laws at your convenience... even if you were the one to set those laws in the first place!"

Mordred blinked, aghast. "Father! You are... being supportive of me!?"

Artoria smiled benevolently. "There is no reason for me to deny your lawful rights, when you have them, Mordred. Even if you never were worthy of the Throne, your status as a treacherous pretender still doesn't change the fact you got undeniable first dibs on this man's heart. Besides, I will not have my child losing to one of the French."

"I'm Austrian by birth. Why does everyone keep forgetting that?" Marie pouted.

Mordred stared blankly at her. "Okay. That's the best kind of support I can hope for from you, I suppose. Wow, I'm really missing Lily now."

Marie took a hand to her chest. "Please, everyone! This isn't a matter of winning or losing!"

 _"Says who...?"_ Mordred, Artoria, Kiyohime, Tamamo and even Mashu all turned icily scary eyes at her.

"See that?" Rito asked Chisame. "That's just how bad you girls look when you're fighting over Negi-sensei..."

"Ah, cut it out already, perv!" Chisame pushed him aside, then clapped. "Okay, let's stop with this farce already, we don't have all freaking day long! You, Dragon Girl, you know you aren't ever marrying a guy with a kiss exclusivity clause anymore, so stop pretending that's the end of the world, believe me, you'll get used to it someday! You, Mo-san, you aren't the type to be that insecure about competition, are you?! And you, Eggplant Girl, Queen Let-Them-Eat-Cake, you're supposed to be better than this, aren't you? So let the fox here have her shot too and then keep on warring against each other far, far from us, as soon as your business here's done!"

"I never actually said that," Rider pointed out.

Shielder grimaced. "Eggplant Girl?"

Chisame shrugged. "You remind me one of one for some reason, sorry?"

Tamamo huffed. "Well, I'm glad to see at least someone here has some common sense. Maybe I'll teach you the Polygamist Castration Fist after all. But first, Husband, let our lips meet in a glorious seal of union!"

"Help," Ritsuka weakly pleaded.

Scathach coughed. "Um, if I may?"

They eyed her suspiciously. "What?" Mordred demanded.

"While all this discussion of kissing and sex is all well and good," Scathach said, "may I remind you that, given how Master's sister is Master Ritsuko, all this jockeying to be first at anything might very well be pointless…?"

"Oh, come on, Scathach!" Mordred said. "What, are you suggesting that Ritsuko took Master's first kiss and his first time and… "

All the Chaldea servants paused. They all shared a thought balloon of big-eyed, SD versions of Ritsuka and Ritsuko, with colored bodies, as if they were naked. They shared the image of SD Ritsuko leaping at SD Ritsuka, pushing him to the ground, than doing unseeable things on top of him behind a mosaic censor. They all shuddered, then glanced sideways at their master. He just stared back with a hollow-eyed, haunted look.

"Even Master Ritsuko wouldn't…" Mashu began very hesitantly and sounding like she couldn't believe such crap was coming out of her mouth.

"Yes," everyone else chorused, each looking a bit hollow-eyed themselves, as if remembering something that had happened to them. "Yes, she would."

"So, perhaps we should just let Tamamo have her little kiss and forget about all this, shall we?" Scathach suggested with what for her would have been serene cheerfulness.

"I still won't allow-!" Kiyohime began weakly, but then Evangeline cut her short.

"Just something before you do that, Fox Spirit," the tiny blonde growled. "After this is done with... that's it, right? There aren't any more empty headed legendary figures with this loser who would keep on demanding for more Pactios until the sun goes out, right? Because I swear this is growing fucking tiresome by now..."

"Well," Tamamo huffed, "the only ones who came along who might be interested would be Mary and Anne, but I don't see them pushing for it that much, they mostly like to tease shamelessly and little else..."

Ritsuka, remembering their offer of a threesome once, for once wisely kept his mouth shut.

"Okay, that's good to know," Eva snapped her fingers. "Girla, get on with it already before we die of old age here, even the immortals!"

"You aren't my Master and you can't tell me what to do!" Illya grouched, already crouched down and finishing the new Pactio circle.

Karin looked at Evangeline, her expression somewhat more softened now. "And you have to tolerate these people in a daily basis?"

Eva nodded.

"Maybe I've been too harsh on you, Ev-" Karin reached over to caress her head before Chachamaru wordlessly slapped her hand aside.

* * *

 _The Infirmary:_

"So, um," Izumi Ako finally said. "What was all of that about?"

"I wish I could say, really, I do," the female Hakuno sighed.

The male Hakuno hummed. "Well, I suppose that girl disappearing out of sight is no more puzzling than you appearing out of nowhere in the first place."

"I'm telling you," his female counterpart argued, "I didn't just _appear_ , stop implying I'm some sort of ghost or monster! I was enjoying myself somewhere else in the Festival when I suddenly was struck by this white light, and then dropped right in front of you, whoever you are! The Science Clubs are at fault for this, I just know it!"

"Well, I can't completely rule that out," Ako said. "I mean, Hakase-san and Chao-san are both good classmates of mine, but..."

"Wait, do you study with Hakase-san and Chao-san? They're boys," the female Hakuno said.

There was a pause.

"Oh, I see," Caster finally said. "It starts to make sense now, this is what happens when people start fumbling around with True Magics in a forsaken era like this one. You obviously hail from another realm, similar to ours, but where you are this young man's mirror self, the same way the female class of Yuuna-chan all have male counterparts. Quite interesting, this."

"What the hell have you just said, Ma'am," Sajyou Ayaka flatly demanded.

"Maybe I should just walk out and leave you to your own private matters, since I'm obviously not needed here at-" Male Hakuno began, heading for the door before Karna stopped him wordlessly, simply placing a hand on his head. "Well, it was worth a try at least." Karna nodded in agreement, but didn't let go of his head.

Ako gave Caster a look of pure concern. "This is one of those things where I'll have to be either killed or mindwiped, isn't it?"

Caster sighed. "Well, it's not like I can murder one of Yuuna-chan's friends unless absolutely necessary, and you are of the reasonable sort, Ako-chan, so I imagine we might be able to reach an understanding. I'll most likely just mindwipe you, however."

"Please don't call me 'Ako-chan' when I don't even know you and you're talking about violating my mind!" Ako cried. "Okay, let me guess, you're the reason why Yuuna keeps smelling of woman's perfume in her dad's house, aren't you?"

"That's quite correct," Medea nodded.

"And you're another of those Servant guys who're popping all over the place lately, aren't you?" Ako pressed on. Ayaka tried to discreetly slip out then, but found Karna's another hand firmly placed on top of her head, the Lancer still as stoic, and holding Male Hakuno, as before.

"Again, correct," Medea nodded again. "I have watched you from the shadows, hoping for nothing but your best. Despite of what the legends may say about me, I have always loved children, I've just had bad fortune with them, and since you're practically the sisters of my beloved's daughter, of course I would know about you, Ako-chan."

"You're a stalker?" Ako said flatly. "Another one? Really? Wasn't one enough?"

 _Somewhere, Kiyohime sneezed._

"No," Medea said, just as flatly. "There's No DEEP Love involved, I assure you. This is just being invisible and taking notes." There was a pause. "You shouldn't lust after little boys, by the way, now that I can warn you on the subject. I've never seen the appeal myself despite what my sisters told me, and after consideration, anything Zeus likes to do must be a big no-no… "

"I don't-!" Ako started to raise her voice, then sighed miserably and turned aside, waving a hand around. "Okay, I figure we've reached a decent limit of words by now, haven't we? See you around next time, because really, I don't feel like keeping this going for now..."

"Who are you talking to?" Male Hakuno asked.

"I don't know," Ayaka said. "But my sister started doing that before she, well, had a lasting serious breakdown. I'd look into that if I were you... Ako-san, right?"

"Oh dear, Ako-chan," Medea told Yuuna's friend, "you've barely had any scenes lately, what's with that defeatist attitude? Let's just keep on discussing this-"

Ako angrily turned around and pulled her cellphone out. "Hello, Yuuna?! No, I haven't had any problems with any communications, why do you ask?! Never mind, I've got to tell you about something kinda important here!"

"Maybe I should have killed you after all," Caster quietly noted. 

* * *

**To be Continued**.


	11. The Disappearance of Fukawa Touko

"So, any news on who's next?" asked Chidori Kaname during the lunch break.

Tohsaka Rin snorted. "The fox, of course! Tamamo-no-Mae. What's up with that anyway? I'm from the original Visual Novel, why must I play second fiddle to spinoffs? I mean, Marie Antoniette, really? First I get downgraded from Archer to a duck, and now I lose to some Servant whose main claim to fame is a 'Wassup, my homies' meme?"

"It's unfair, really, when you think about it, but just look at that girl, she has it worse," Lucy Heartfilia pointed at a nearby table, where Miyazaki Nodoka sat all alone with a small black cloud hanging over her head. It was even literally raining her. A miniature lightning strike to her ahoge had set it one fire, making her look like a really depressing birthday candle. "She's the second Ministra from the original manga that provides the spine for this thing, and here, what does she get? Even the cheerleader with the recycled design got in before her, and she hasn't had a single appearance in ten chapters straight now..."

The fourth girl sitting with Lucy, Rin and Kaname blinked. She was a very beautiful blonde with her hair in twintails. "Why isn't the Forehead and Braids girl with her? I mean, Saotome, I can understand after she was promoted, but-"

"I think she's consoling those girls from Heartfilia's world, you know, the ones who're still waiting for their arc to start," grumbled Mikazuki Yozora, grimly sipping from her drink. "Anyway, I figure that big tits bitch from Bleach's got a chance after last chapter, that lucky whore..."

The five neglected secondary cast members hanging together at the moment, Rin, Kaname, Lucy, Eri and Yozora, shared a heavy sigh. "I wonder why they even keep us around the set at all," Yozora lamented. "I haven't even seen any action out of, what, a cameo two stages ago? At least in Side Conquests my parallel self got some action."

"I think they write this shit on the fly, and anyone could get drafted in at any time depending on the chief writer's fancy at the time," Rin shrugged. ". That's how Milky Holmes managed to get in, after all. So that's why we're kept around like this. At least, that's what I heard from Deadpool."

"You're trusting the gaijin's word on this," Yozora growled.

"Hey, I'm even more of a foreigner than he is! So what's up with those prejudices?" Lucy said.

Yozora sighed. "You still were created in Japan, numbskull! He wasn't, that's what I'm talking about!"

Then Nodoka's phone came to life. With a suddenly bright expression, the short haired librarian picked up her phone, read avidly through the latest text message, and then quickly left the cafeteria after leaving a generous tip for the waitress.

"Well," Rin guessed, "I suppose something finally turned up for her. Poor girl, seriously, first UQ Holder does that to her, and now this. I hope things turn out better for her from here on. And for me, of course!"

"Oh, stop complaining, at least you had the Unlimited Blade Works anime and will be showing up in the Heaven's Feel movies," Yozora snarled. "My ending is way more unresolved than yours!"

Kaname sighed. "If I'm ever drafted in, I only hope Sousuke and Kyoko-chan get in as well. I mean, I'd take the offer either way, but it wouldn't be the same..."

"Okay, that's enough filler," Director Nabeshin approached their table, clapping for them to get up and clear out already. "You did good enough for a quirky intro, but now the actual story stuff must start again, thank you, we'll call you back as soon as we get more scenes for you to do..."

This is the life of the Unequally Rational and Emotional cast of thousands. Who will make it to the final lineup, to get the mysterious reward promised for those left standing and as Ala Alba members with alliances by the time the equivalent of Chapter 355 is reached? Will we ever get there at all? Well, we'll never do if we don't start rolling now! So let's begin!

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice.**

 **Chapter Eleven**.

 **The Disappearance of Fukawa Touko**.

* * *

"What?!" Rin cried. "Even that smelly bitch gets some spotlight before we do! What has she done so far? Isn't this just more stalling?"

No, actually, she's integrated in a way meant to move the main plot ahead. _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ is the creation and property of Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha, _Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc_ is the creation and property of Spike Chunsoft.

"How much screentime has she had before this, one scene?!" Lucy cried. "At least I have the Fairy Tail omakes under my belt!"

She's still got more screentime to her credit than Yozora.

"Oh, bite me, you ass!" Yozora foolishly provoked the author. Who likes aggressive girls with glasses, by the way.

"Ah, so that's why, of course," Eri sighed, shaking her head. "Well, never mind then..."

"Seriously, SCM doesn't follow that Danganronpa shit, either!" Yozora added. "That makes this choice all the more baffling!"

(Don't look at me, I just work here. I'm still trying to put in the flashback chapter about Bruce Wayne being a crossdresser who sneaked into the detective school.)

"Wait, what?" Rin said. "Seriously? Wow, you are such a dead man…"

Special thanks to Darkenning for some key pieces of dialogue.

* * *

 _Library Island:_

"T-T-To Miyazaki Nodoka, please!" stuttered the short girl standing before the desk of the famous author doing the signing. Behind this eager, nervous girl with bangs obscuring her face stood an even shorter, plain looking girl with a wide forehead, thick braids tied with tiny bells, and a small mouth currently constricted in the strange expression of a neutral emoticon.

"Miyazaki Nodoka, right," droned the slightly smelly older girl with glasses and much longer, thinner braids, taking Nodoka's copy of _Genocider Syo Origins_ and opening it on its first page. "Anything else?"

Nodoka shook her head nervously. "N-No, that's fine, I realize you're short on time and, and-!"

Fukawa Touko dryly stared at the watch on the wall. Almost lunchtime, now, and the heat was worse than ever, this damn academy was just too hot and humid. Of course, it also was Touko's fault for arriving dressed in a long and highly covering black dress, but those were her preferences and she stuck to them no matter what. She wasn't shameless enough to cavort around in a swimsuit like that freak from her class, Asahina Aoi, or the Enoshima bitch for that matter or… well, every other person in Mahora Academy. "Yeah," she finally said. "Yeah, tell you what, I'll sign yours and your buddy's and then take a break for lunch. Sorry everybody else, it won't be long," she mumbled, not really meaning it and not caring much either as the small security staff assigned to her by her agent began herding the disappointed, groaning fans out, distributing numbered tickets among them so they wouldn't lose their turn after the young prodigy writer's return.

As they did this, Yue noticed something slightly odd about one of the security staffers, a girl who was too short and young looking for that kind of job. Judging from Kero's expression, he felt rather strongly about her presence too, as his eyes were bulging out slightly despite how he still tried to keep the appearance of an ornament hanging from Nodoka's necklace. The rest of the staff struck Yue as odd choices as well, being a man who was perhaps a bit too skinny and two young women, instead of the big, burly men usually protecting most success writers in an era of greedy supervillains roaming the globe (there were at least 936 Supervillains who had a Twilight theme. Granted, most of them boiled down to 'Kill Stephenie Meyer' but still). Then again, girls like Setsuna and Kaede were living proof seemingly innocent young ladies were as capable as any man, so Yue paid it no bigger attention than that.

If you're not picking up this blatant foreshadowing, then we judge you.

Instead, she moved forward with two books as soon as Nodoka graciously moved aside. She placed both copies of the crime novel before the frowning Fukawa and said, "Sorry, but one's mine and the other belongs to our friend Haruna. She couldn't make it here today, being too busy elsewhere, but-"

"The rules were clear," Touko bluntly said, signing only one of the books. "Only one autograph per individual."

"S-Sorry," Yue gulped, being unused to being treated with such coldness by a favorite writer. "I just thought, maybe, for a special and highly devoted fan like her-"

"If she's so devoted, why isn't she here instead?" Touko huffed, instantly lowering the duo's opinion of her a fair lot. Still, seeing their disappointed faces, the older girl just grunted in a very Chisame-esque way, although she still mostly smelled like Negi on a hot day, instead. "Fine, all right, but only because you're the last two and nobody's looking." She gave a quick autograph on Haruna's book as well and then passed both back to the bowing Yue. "So, do you two know of a good place around here to eat, or something like that?"

The very young girl in the staff approached, and then Nodoka finally caught a good direct view of her, finding her strangely familiar. "Fukawa-sama," she said, pushing her large glasses up her tiny nose, "I'm afraid lunch has been cancelled for now."

Touko gave her an exasperated stare. "And why's that? I'm the one calling the shots here, not y-"

"Oh, I wouldn't know about that," said the male staffer, swiftly pulling out a ridiculously long barreled gun out of the front of his pants and then aiming it directly at the gasping Touko's face, while Nodoka recoiled and reached for the Clow book in her light vest. "I'd say the one calling the shots is the one with the big gun who's happy to see you, isn't that right? By the way, hello again... Card Girl, right? And you must be, ah, I don't think we've ever met before, sorry..."

As the man's grin grew impossibly wide, Nodoka pulled a card out, only to be hit across the stomach faster than she could react when the girl with glasses darted ahead for her, giggling in a disturbingly manic fashion.

Then everything, if you will excuse the cliche, grew tar pit black.

See? Foreshadowing.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Hello. We might have a bit of an extra problem, here," Negi said as he entered the already crowded meeting room, making all heads but Yuuna's turn around to meet him. "Well, another extra problem."

"Oh, hello, Negi-kun!" Konoka brightly waved. "Iinchou said you had just met up with Batman-sama?"

"Um, yes, but he left again almost as soon," the young teacher nodded. "He just... disappeared on us while we weren't looking. Before leaving, he said he'd gather his allies and start combing the campus around for Scarecrow-san and Joker-san, so..."

"Sensei, there's no need to address human scum– and my no-good sister– with honor of respect," Setsuna quietly said. "I assume, then that Pactio links aren't working for you either, since you didn't just summon us to your side?"

He shook his head. "No, sorry, I even tried to contact you all on the way here, but looks like I can only keep a telepathic link with Ayaka..." As the Class Rep smiled proudly at this and Misa glared at her, he looked over at the corner where Yuuna was having a frantic conversation through her cellphone. "Um, is something wrong with Akashi-san?"

"I guess so," Konoka looked that way, too. "Ako-chan just called her, and sounds like there's something going on about Yuuna's papa, I think..."

"Stop dancing around the subject, Ako, I promise I won't get mad!" the basketball player was arguing, with her back to the others. She sounded mad, which probably explained Ako's reluctance. "I'm always rational and level headed, aren't I?-! Hey, that time doesn't count, it was hot coffee! Even if it's about that absent minded, no-good, flaky and secret-keepin' Oyaji, so stop stalling already, dammit!"

"Ah, well, I suppose it's a family matter we shouldn't get involved in," Negi decided, then realized the new addition in the white bikini around the table who just stared at him with very wide eyes while keeping her hands on her lap. "Oh, that's right, Tomoe-san, Ayaka mentioned you too. Sorry you've been dragged into this, we swear we'll do everything in our power to keep you safe until... well, graduation, actually!"

Mami smiled at him as best as she could, trying not to lose her head, a faint blush on her cheeks. "That's all right, you don't have to apologize over anything, Sensei. None of what happened was your fault! And I'm just honored you know my name at all..."

"He knows everyone's name, like shota Santa Claus," Misa coldly said. "Don't start feeling too flattered, now."

"Okay, so you met the Caster, and the Caster didn't kill you, that's fine. Great, even! Wait a sec," Yuuna turned her head back to Negi. "Hey, Negi-kun, looks like Ako finally found our Caster, or rather, the Caster found her! From her description, sounds like the same woman from Kuro's exposition..."

"Tell her to keep her distance just in case, and that we'll be sending a team her way as soon as possible," the teacher said. "Kuro-san mentioned there are Servants who could take others' appearances, we can't leave anything to chance. Ahem. Well, as I was about to tell Ayaka through our telepathic conversation, I've also ran into a few people who, well, might have been let it into my secret? Sorry about that, again..."

"Your secret?" Madoka wondered aloud. "Excuse me, do you even have any secrets anymore, Negi-kun? I swear it looks like most of the campus already knows you're a mage..."

"This, this isn't that bad, two of them already are versed in the supernatural, and only the other two are complete mundanes!" Negi protested. "It's Kurosaki-san and Kuchiki-san, turns out they are ghost hunters of sorts. They even are good friends with Sayo-san, so there's no big problem with them learning about me, I suppose..."

"But no matter what Asuna says, ghosts aren't exactly magical, so you still shouldn't have let them in, right, Negi-kun?" Konoka asked.

"Ghosts aren't magical?" Sora asked. "Actually, I think I'd agree with Kagurazaka-san there, ghosts just have to be magic in nature..."

"No, if they were magical, only magi and wizards could have ghosts, don't you think?" Konoka reasoned. "And Asuna-chan touching Sayo-chan would cancel her and make her cease to exist. So ghost related matters shouldn't interlap with magic related matters, so Negi-kun still goofed again..."

Negi sobbed. "In my defense, I didn't tell them anything, Chao-san did."

"Chao-san?!" Ayaka growled. "How could she?! Deserting you to… to outsiders like that! She'd better have a very good justification for this!"

"Before leaving, she announced her clear intentions to reveal magic to the whole world, so I'm pretty sure it's not something exclusively related to my magic, Iinchou," Negi tried to placate her, although the expressions on his Ministra's faces after that told him he'd only managed to disturb them even further. "Please don't panic, I'm sure she won't be able to, even for an extremely resourceful and charismatic millionaire supergenius with magic of her own, performing such a feat is an impossible task. Anyway, I left Kurosaki-san, Kuchiki-san, Orihime-san and Honsho-san outside with the Baron, Misora, Cocone and Chamo while we-"

"The bleached thug, the Ojou, the top-heavy loon and one of the top five crazy lesbians, then?" Misa grunted. "That's the kind of people we have to deal with now? Well, I guess they're still not as bad as Suzumiya, but..."

"He says that's his natural hair, not Bleach," Negi benevolently explained before Yuuna's voice exploded into a scream of rage.

"S-S-S-S-SHE SAYS SHE'S MY DAD'S FUCKING WHAT?!-?!"

"... ah," Negi very quietly told the rest of his Ministra. "I suppose that's why he acted so strange when the topic of Servants came up the other day at the Headmaster's office, then."

"Didn't Kuro-chan say Caster-san was a loving wife?" Sakurako mused. "I imagine Yuuna's papa is in good hands in that case, at least as long as he doesn't betray her or-"

"SHUDDUP, I'M TRYING TO HAVE A RATIONAL CONVERSATION ABOUT SOME HARPY OUT TO DRAIN MY FATHER OF MANA AND HIS SOUL HERE!" Yuuna roared her way, greatly scaring Sakurako herself, Sora, Negi and Mami. Konoka and Setsuna simply rolled their eyes at each other in silence. "NOW GET ME THAT, THAT, WITCH ON THE PHONE, AKO! SHE'S GONNA HEAR A PIECE OF MY MIND BEFORE I GET THERE AND KICK HER ANCIENT ASS MYSELF!"

"Language!" Negi chided.

Ayaka sighed and got up. "I'll go for some drink and perhaps a few snacks for you, Tomoe-sempai, if you'll excuse me just a moment."

* * *

 _ _Still the rooftop:__

"You know, it's kind of funny, all Pactios before this seemed to have a lot more buildup," Mordred observed as Tamamo-no-Mae tightly hugged Ritsuka against her front, making sure to mash her bosom against his chest, and then forced her mouth onto his, slipping the tongue in skillfully. Shirou and Rito flinched. This was, like, reverse rape man, not cool, was the general vague thought they shared. Chisame found herself being disturbingly reminded of Kuro, ah ,'feeding'.

"Well, it can't be helped, we're running out of time here after all," Chisame said. A few steps away, Matoi was crouching down, trying to console the irate Kiyohime to the best of her abilities, which were admittedly abysmal since 'consoling' wasn't one of the many skills she'd picked up. The petite Berserker was shouting up a storm, turned away from the kiss and face down against the floor, Heracles sitting on her back to make sure she'd be pinned down effectively during the procedures.

"—I agree it shouldn't be done, Kiyohime-sama," the young stalker was agreeing sympathetically, "but I'm outranked and outvoted here, you know? There, there, this pain will only make the eventual pleasure of revenge all that much sweeter, I'm sure…"

"—BURN IT ALL TO THE GROUND, SPARE NO ONE, MY HEART, MY HEART, MY ANCHIN-SAMA!"

Finally, Caster pulled away from a drained, briefly husk-looking and yellowed Fujimaru, his eyes black empty sockets. She patted his shoulders as she licked her lips all over, savoring the taste and showing off her cute little fangs. "Ahhhhhh, that was really good!" she announced, making sure everyone around would hear her clearly.

Mordred rolled her eyes, somehow making the movement obvious through the helmet. "Really compensating for something, aren't you, fox?"

"You'd be the expert on compensating for something, wouldn't you Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl?" Tamamo sneered. Then, as if an afterthought, she reached up and caught the card descending slowly in a hand. "Let's see what did we get here, then, shall we?"

"Damn it, why do you people keep confusing me with Sir Definitely-Not-A-Girl!-? We look nothing alike!"

Karin, Lala, Momo, Nana and Marie all leaned over curiously, while Mashu still tried to avert her gaze awkwardly. The card had Tamamo's image, posing demurely and yet with a flirtatious smirk on her face, with the words _CASTER- Tamamo No Mae- Quaelibet Vulpes Caudam Suam Laudat_ written underneath.

Her astral sign, naturally, was Sol.

"Ho ho ho ho!" laughed Caster, primly placing a hand next to her mouth. "Not bad, I might and perhaps should have been the 'Magistra' instead, but after all, the place of a traditional wife is under her husband!"

"I think," Scathach noted, "that has nothing to do with your status as a 'wife' and everything to do with your status as a Servant."

Kiyohime wailed desperately. "—ANCHIN-SAMA, WHY, WHY?! THIS WOUND SHALL NEVER HEAL, MY EYES SHALL NEVER STOP CRYING, THE DAMNED SHALL NEVER RISE AGAIN AFTER I BRING UNTOLD HAVOC UPON ALL, MY EDGE, MY EDGE, MY DARK AND GRITTY EDGE!—"

"Oh dear," Mashu sighed. "She's talking like Jeanne Alter now. That's never good."

"Quiet!" Illya commanded. "Geez, such noisy, bothersome Servants! Well, we're done here now, right? Looks like it'll be a while before he can summon the rest of his Servants," she poked a thumb towards the comatose-on-his-feet Ritsuka, whose vital signs were being diligently read and noted down by Chachamaru, "so I'm going to meet Negi already!"

"Look, I don't think you want to make a scene in Dinosaur Land," Chisame sighed, "so what if we head over to the Haunted House? Negi-sensei's bound to go back there after he's done with his other sister, and then we can settle the rest of this mess out. Okay?"

"Sounds reasonable enough to me," Sayoko nodded.

"Yeah, I really want to see Haruna-chan again," Rito smiled. "I'll try to call Mikan and Nao and tell 'em to meet us there, too…"

"All right, big post-Pactio celebration party at the Haunted House!" Lala cheered, throwing her arms up. "This is going to be fun!"

"Sounds very good indeed!" Momo beamed a saintly smile(public domain) while rubbing her hands together, discreetly. "Let's go, then!"

"You aren't going to set the stage for any sort of licencious free-for-all, Momo," her twin warned her.

"Who, me?" Momo innocently said.

"They like to make a party out of everything," Evangeline was explaining to Karin. "Unless you're breathing on their necks the whole time, they'll slack the hell away on their training. Boya's pretty much the only one with any sense of dedication."

Artoria coughed stoically.

"You don't count, you aren't my student, you just randomly challenge Sakurazaki to duels here and there so you can curbstomp her!" Eva reminded her. "Well, I guess Sakurazaki takes things seriously enough too, but she's still too easily distracted whenever Konoe joins the celebr—"

"Who are 'Boya' and 'Sakurazaki'?" Karin interrupted.

"Boya is Chisame's roommate, my chief student at the time," her former Master explained. "He's a m-moron, but I guess he has enough potential for great things if I can work a miracle out of him. Sakurazaki is some half crow demon who—"

"Oh, a half-tengu?" Caster asked, visibly interested. "I haven't seen one of those in a while! The variety with fixed genders, or the other?"

"The former," the vampire said. "She's traumatized enough as it is, if she happened to have the dilemma of choosing genders on top of everything, she wouldn't be functional at all."

Karin frowned thoughtfully. "Genderfluid bird demons? That… That somehow reminds me of something, but I'm not sure of what…"

Caster laughed at her longtime friend and rival. "You're eager to meet that person too, aren't you, Kiyo-chan? If someone's as much of a Japanese myth lover as I, that's you, certainly!"

"—MAKE YOU EXTINCT, SHAMELESS JEZEBEL, BACKSTABBING FEMALE DOG, HORRIBLE EXCUSE FOR A SERVANT AND—"

Shirou looked at Scathach. "Is she going to act like that all day long?"

"All day?" Lancer said, laughing. "Try 'all month' long, rather…! If we're lucky!"

* * *

 _Library Island:_

"Like I care about propriety!" Haruna cried. "Saotome Subtle Lock Picking Technique!" She swung a leg at the door, kicking it off its frame and then promptly storming into the wide autograph hall.

"Wow, what a 'me' thing to do," Asuna quietly said, pouring in after her and accompanied by Satomi and the still-invisible Diarmuid. Shortly behind them hung the somewhat older receptionist of the Library, Shiomiya Shiori, a cute brunette with a petite body size and very fair skin, wearing the same formal librarian attire she always wore on the job despite of the torrid heat. The fact the whole island was air conditioned help.

Shiori still was rubbing her heavy, sleepy eyes with the back of a small fist, but was by now lucid enough to see the hall was deserted, large stacks of books still piled on Fukawa-san's desk. Haruna-san was hissing to herself, crouching down at a certain spot to pick something up, looking at it closely before cursing under her breath and tucking it into her cleavage. At the same time, Asuna-san, whom Shiori barely knew at all because of her extremely sparse reading habits, was approaching the desk, gasping before turning back to her.

"Um, Shiomiya-sempai, right?" the redhead said. "Could you wait outside just a little while, please?"

Shiori blinked. "Ah? But, it's standard procedure for—"

"I'll take over, remember I'm also authorized staff, Sempai," Haruna said as she stood back up, far more serious, and even grim, than her custom, which actually scared Shiori a little, and not in the usual way she scared her. "It won't be long, alright?"

Shiori could only nod sheepishly before backing away a lot, and exiting the picture without any further protests. There was a beat beat, and then she stuck her head back in. "Saotome-san! Give me back my panties!"

"Oops. Sorry, force of habit," Haruna said, pulling a wadded up ball of cloth from a pocket and tossing it overhand. Shiori almost fumbled catching moving away and sighing, presumably to put it back on somewhere private.

Once Haruna was sure Shiori was out of hearing range trying to find said private location, she marched to the desk and pulled the tiny gag off the mouth of the small stuffed animal left sitting on the wooden surface, heavily tied and restrained. "Situation, Kero," she humorlessly demanded.

"'Bout time, dammit!" Kerberos spat, finally snapping from his 'inanimate object' wild eyed pose now Shiori wasn't around. "It's those weirdoes from Kyoto, Haruna! The grinning clown, the two dangerous Magical Women, and the crazy swordsgirl! Th-They took Nodoka and Yue, and the book author too!"

"Oh crap," Asuna bit on her tongue.

"We should have foreseen this, in hindsight," Satomi exhaled. She took a clinical look all around. "Well, there are some slight signs of struggle, but no blood at all, that's good…"

Kero shook his head in despair. "They took them away before Nodoka could put up a fight! That damn crazy girl moved like lightning! Yue got one or two whacks in since she was surrounded by books after all, but it was useless! She was knocked out as well!"

Haruna pulled the card that had been placed under Kero from the desk. It was, predictably enough, the Tarot sample of the grinning vagrant, idiotically prancing across the fields.

 _Le Fou_.

Still, she noted inwardly, while this still fit the Joker's motif very well, why a card from the Tarot arcana and not the usual modern day Joker playing card? What was the meaning behind that?

Moments after, the three girls, the spirit, and the plush toy now secured to Haruna's hip were storming out again. "Sempai," Hakase told Shiori, who sat nearby nervously sipping on a carton of juice Yue had given her earlier that morning. "Please tell us, once again, what happened when these people left."

Shiori blinked. "Ah? W-Well, l-like I-I-I t-told you, I-I couldn't s-see them l-leaving! This, this pr-pretty lady, th-the r-redhead, c-came out a-after I heard something i-inside. I-I asked her w-what was going on, sh-she smiled a-and o-o-offered m-me a r-r-rose, the r-rose smelled v-very nice and then I, I think I f-fell asleep, but…!"

Haruna sighed. "Figures. Well, call the Headmaster's office and tell him there's been a kidnapping, now! But don't tell anyone else. We'll keep in contact."

Shiori blinked as the three girls began all but running towards the front door. "Ah?! But, but, are Nodoka-san and Yue-san okay?! T-There must be something I can do, too! Haruna-san, what, what is-!"

"Later, Sempai!" Haruna promised as she slammed the door closed behind them. Shiori gulped loudly, she'd never seen the happy go lucky Library Explorer like that before.

And now she had this urgent need to go pee, too.

* * *

Elsewhere, Yue and Nodoka sat on identical wooden chairs, with Fukawa Touko placed between them. The Joker himself sat before them, now clothed as a typical tropical tourist with a Hawaiian shirt, colorful shorts, sandals, a floppy hat and a camera around his neck. He seemed to be enjoying himself, loudly sipping from a large cup of drink through a long straw. Yue's first question to pop into her mind was what kind of beverage that was, actually. Then she assumed even she probably didn't want to know.

At the very least, it didn't seem like any of them had any of their clothes removed during the time they'd been unconscious and brought here, wherever that was. The mere thought of spending missing time in the clutches of Joker and Tsukuyomi was troubling enough on its own, they didn't need any added worries on top of that. Fukawa-san was far more vocal and less restrained on the subject when the first words out of her mouth while there were, "You're going to abuse us, aren't you?!"

Yue flinched while Nodoka paled terribly. "That… That doesn't sound like the best thing to ask under the circumstances, Fukawa-san…" Ayase told the best-selling author.

"Well, it's the Joker, of course I'd ask that!" the girl with glasses snapped, briefly kicking her spindly legs up as best as she could through their restrains. "There's no depth he wouldn't stoop down to, and I'm a desirable, young nubile thing! But I'll die before that! My purity belongs only to Togami-sama! You can defile my corpse, but that's the extent of it!"

Nodoka paled even more, while Yue's right eyebrow pulsed slightly. "That… That wasn't a very wise thing to say, either…"

"Oh, who are you, a second rate assistant librarian in a second rate academy?!" the Honnouji student protested. "Besides, whatever we say won't change the outcome, one way or another! I've done research on this freak, you know! He won't deviate from his demented train of thought just because of what we, whom he'll perceive as inferior beings, say or—"

The Joker finally spoke, quietly coughing into a chalk white fist. "Please, lady! If you'd done the research, you'd know I don't rape! I leave that to the henchmen, much like breaking the windows and the rest of the menial tasks! I'm the Napoleon of Criminal Comedy, the Mozart of Humorous Genocide, I don't have the time for thuggish, unrefined behavior like that! What do I look like, Jared Leto?"

Fukawa blinked. "But, the testimony of Johnny Frost…"

"Azzarello books don't count!" The Joker suddenly growled quite viciously before mercurially shifting back to a creepily apologetic grin. "Besides, sorry, but I'm not into girls who are flat like planks."

"More like you can't get it up no matter what!" it was Fukawa's turn to explode into anger at the offense, although in all fairness it'd been mostly a mere statement of a truth.

"Will you please stop provoking him into raping us?!" demanded Yue, while Nodoka was by now even whiter than Joker himself. Then Miyazaki realized there were at least three small, dark bipedal creatures roaming nervously around the Clown Prince's chair. They were all solid black, with large and glowing yellow eyes, and something about them caused a strange additional sensation of discomfort within her.

"Wh-What are those things?" Nodoka gulped. "Orphans?"

"Well, I wouldn't know, I don't speak their language, if they have one, and I can't ask them about good ole' Mom and Dad," Joker chuckled, reaching down to pet the head of one of the shadowy critters, then casually pulling back before it could bite his long and bony fingers off. "But if you really need to know, they're actually called Heartless. Not from around here, I had them imported… well, no, that's a lie, I was offered them by an exclusive importer who only asked for a trinket or two in return. Would you happen to know any Princesses, by the way?"

"Princesses?" Yue echoed dubiously, instantly thinking of Lala.

Joker smiled like a placid crocodile. "The lady commanding these darlings around is in the business of scouting young startlets, apparently! Specifically searching for seven princesses with pure hearts that blah blah, can unlock the gates of Darkness, blah blah, I think she just wants to gather herself a lesbian harem like forehead here, I'm sure, but whatever, it's stupid to contradict the insane, I should know…"

"Don't have a harem!" Yue snapped, finally getting to use her running gag again.

Fukawa blinked a few times. "Wow. You truly are out of your mind! What kind of story is that?"

"I know, right?" Joker shrugged. "By the way, I'm a big fan, Miss F. Genocider Syo is one of my idols, along with the Marx Brothers, Idi Amin and Alfred E. Neuman! I was especially impressed by the third murder in the latest book, that was a masterwork! I didn't see it coming!"

Touko smiled proudly. "Well, thank you! I worked a long time on that one, actually. I had to justify Henry not being able to—No, wait a bloody second here, what is this, some sort of 'Misery' thing?! You're not going to ask me to write a Genocider Syo and Joker crossover versus Batman novel or something like that, are you?!"

Joker blinked, seemingly wounded to the core. "Why would I do that…?! Nothing good comes from pressuring a genius into altering their work! Besides, _I_ want to write that one, myself… I was thinking of forcing you to sign an authorization for a spinoff, but that was for later, right now I wanted to…"

He hummed, then looked aside, rubbing his forehead with two fingers as if to help himself get back on track of a lost idea. Finally, he flashed another grin and turned back to the girls. "Oh, I know, you think you're so Genre Savvy, don't you? And this, surely, is the scene where the Big Bad rants about his scheme to the trapped heroine… Well, joke's on you, gals! You aren't the heroines, you only rank secondary roles at best, and I don't have to reveal anything until the actual hero is in my clutches, so nyah!"

"Negi-sensei always says," Nodoka said, "we're all the protagonists of our own stories, and that we shouldn't think of ourselves as secondary characters."

Joker rolled his eyes, and so did the Heartless and Fukawa, actually. Yue only had a Sweatdrop Moment. "Your teacher's only what, ten? What does he know about life yet? Seriously, Library Rat, get a clue already!"

Nodoka forced a challenging, of somewhat shaky, little smirk. "You may mock Negi-sensei now, but he'll find and defeat you! I have the utmost faith he'll rescue us!"

Fukawa grimaced. "You're trusting a ten years old on, well, anything? I'd rather place my hopes on my Togami-sama! The young millionaire, my greatest fan, and coincidentally classmate! As soon as news of my kidnapping reach his ears, he'll move heaven and earth to find me!"

"You mean Togami Byakuya?" Yue dubiously asked, remembering the name from a lot of news reading and some passing mentions by an invariably disgusted Ayaka. "Doesn't he always vehemently deny any relationship with you every time the press asks him on the topic?"

Touko screeched. "Who asked for your opinion on any of this?! It's your stupid academy's fault we're here, this never would have happened in Honnouji!"

"Well, it wouldn't have been impossible, far from it," Joker said with apparent good humor, "but I'll admit this caper would have been a bit harder to pull off in your fascistic city-state! Seriously, I hate oppressive Lawful Evil governments like that, because well, Lawful, who would ruin a perfectly good Evil with that kind of despicable trait? As soon as Mally gets her Princess I'll talk her into flattening that dystopic, militaristic hellhole first, then we'll see how their perfectly structured and controlled order works, heh heh…"

Yue sneered quietly, taking another look around the apparently featureless room, apparently very wide and spacious, and poorly lit as well. "Are we still in Mahora?" she asked, feeling like she wasn't gambling too much by doing so. "And where's the rest of your gang, anyway?"

"Oh, you should count yourself lucky Yomi isn't here now, she _did_ want to rape you girls," Joker matter-of-factly commented, making Touko and Nodoka squirm and squeak. "That girl, no patience at all, I tell you. I had to insist she'd only be ruining the punchline, and believe me, she needed a good father figure so much! Unfortunately, her being my kid is a different crossover fic entirely, so too bad. Normally I hate any sort of discipline, but well, in her case that was a must!"

"Um, thank you, then, I suppose," Yue said after a loud gulp.

Joker nodded. "You're welcome. Literally, since I brought you here, ha hah! As for your other question, well, you could say we're still in Mahora, technically, or very deep under it at least. But don't get your hopes UP, because we're as DOWN as we can get, and this is the only place where no one in Mahora will ever come to look for us…"

Then, suddenly, he grinned demonically and grabbed all three of their chairs, forcing them around so they could see the rest of the chamber. Yue saw what had been behind their backs the whole time now. The room, apparently, was some sort of gigantic underground tomb, and Quartum sat, silent and eerily fascinated, before a huge cross between a tube and a crystal coffin, containing a tall, dark, hooded and cloaked figure inside. It was impossible to tell the figure's gender in the darkness, but it only made Nodoka's former feelings of unease shoot up into overdrive, so much she downright panicked without knowing the actual reason. Even Touko only could gulp helplessly, impressed despite herself.

"What have I gotten myself into?" she quietly wondered.

"Why, it's just the next stage of a game, of course," Joker malevolently crooned into her ear from behind. "So welcome, New Player, we only hope you don't survive the experience…"

"Will this part of the game have giant vampire moon rabbit kaiju?" Yue said.

"Shut up kid, no one likes a smartass."

* * *

Yet somewhere else, Naba (not Honsho!) Chizuru was having a pleasant enough private time with the only person in this chapter even more screwed up than the Joker.

They sat together in the back row of one of the first promotional screenings of the latest actual, non-cover up student movie by the only other person in this story that came close to being as screwed up as either of them. Chizuru was already hating this cheap, stupid, lurid and mindless drivel with every fiber of her being, but oddly enough, it looked like her father was liking it well enough. He was smiling through it at the very least, although if she knew him enough- and she felt confident enough she did- she would have wagered he only was thinking of eventually seducing the young stars of the flick. Most likely even the boy.

Chizuru had to admit that boy was kind of cute, in a way. Why Kugimiya had ignored him while pining after the other insipid male in that club, Chizuru had no idea. She briefly weighed the merits of letting her father seduce the SOS Brigade versus letting him come into contact with Suzumiya Haruhi, and found herself worryingly divided.

"So, how are you getting along with Negi-kun?" her father asked her just barely past the point of the confrontation between the cute bunnygirl waitress and the petite alien witch, while Tsuruya-san's badly edited laughter rang across the theater and many moviegoers quietly made their way for the door.

"Fine enough, of course," she quietly said, wondering why his hand was not on her knee, or any other part of her for that matter, by now. Had she done anything to upset him? It was not like anyone else would notice in the darkness, and the projection room was sparsely attended as it was. "Um, I suppose you could say he's much closer to Ayaka these days, but we share a relationship of mutual proper respect as you-"

"I heard," Naba Genjuro calmly commented, enjoying the anonymity of this place, where he could be just another face in the crowd, "he was advising some sort of student club?"

"Ah, yes, the English Research Society," the busty girl nodded. "Hadn't I told you about it?"

"I don't remember it," he flat out lied, smirking at the next closeup of Asahina Mikuru's cleavage. The sound editing for this thing was all sorts of awful, but obviously the visual editor knew their priorities well. Maybe he should search them out and offer them a job in his private staff afterwards. "It's a club meant to make children closely acquainted with English culture, isn't it? Perhaps you should join it, Chizuru. As long as the Astronomy Club doesn't keep you too busy, naturally."

"Not at all, Father," she quickly said, seizing on the chance. In truth, she had been waiting for this for some time now. She imagined this go-ahead meant her father's schemes had finally entered their next stage, but mostly, it gave her a chance to get closer to Ayaka again, not to mention helping Natsumi-chan with her own romantic issues… "You know I can multitask."

"Oh, do I," the mature man smiled pleasantly, affably patting his daughter's knee and then giving it a gentle squeeze. Chizuru waited a moment, and then the hand discreetly moved onto her thigh, caressing the soft and fair skin exposed by her shorts. She smiled to herself, idly twiddling her fingers together in anticipation for what there was to come after the movie.

Just one more reason to hope for the damned thing to end up already. Seriously, it dragged on and on, who did that Suzumiya bitch think she was? Peter Jackson?

Several seats apart, Tohsaka Sakura squinted through the darkness, peeking in their general direction. "Nee-san," she whispered to the girl sitting by her side with an angry Servant in Spirit form hovering over her, "isn't that Naba Genjuro, the multi-millionaire…?"

"Don't be silly, Sakura," Rin grumbled while munching on some popcorn, wishing to go leave already but refusing to give up before Luviagelita did. "What would a man of power, influence and prestige be doing, wasting his time in a student festival, watching the world's worst student movie?"

With a seething, barely restrained invisible Destroyer floating over her and staring chainsaws Vigilante's way, Luvia simply hummed to herself, rubbing her chin in deep thought. "I don't think it's that bad, actually…"

"Well, of course you wouldn't!" Rin growled.

"I mean, the naif, kitsch mechanics of the plot and the visual effects do remind me a lot of professional wrestling," Luvia began to smile. "I can respect that, it's a very intelligent way to cater to a wide audience, while hiding deeper meaning superficial obtuse critics like you would always miss on, Rin! You fail to catch the subtle social commentary on the realities of local commerce and the sexual exploitation in the mass media of the sci-fi genre, but we know better, don't we, Miyu?"

"I'm not sure I'm old enough to be watching this," very quietly said the little girl sitting at Luvia's other side, while the camera zoomed directly on Mikuru's ass. Really, it was much too big and round and fat. Better if it were smaller, with a narrower waist, a pronounced youth, perhaps with an albino skin tone…

"Oh, sure, you've always excused any trite trash that accommodates your low intelligence by simply labeling it 'camp'!" Rin told her rival.

"Shut up, don't start shouting in a movie and show some manners!" Luvia shouted back. The other audience members, instead of hushing them as they usually would, turned their heads to pay attention at them rather than the movie itself. A live catfight is always better than a filmed, and badly filmed at that, one, after all. "You never showed any appreciation for the fine arts, so stop pretending to be a film critic! At least I actually know what I'm talking about!"

"You think pro wrestling is a valid storytelling venue, your opinion is automatically null!" Rin roared while being more and more tempted by Vigilante's whispered suggestions to engage into battle already. Meanwhile, hovering undetected by Sakura's other side, Fran-chan sighed to herself.

Out of all the grievous wastes of perfectly useful energy she'd witnessed in this era, what there was on that large, luminous screen had to be the worst offender, by far…

* * *

 _Deep Underground:_

"Who is that, though?" Fukawa finally asked. Her eyes widened. "Is that Elvis-sama?"

"No, of course not. Why do people always think of Elvis? Let me tell you a story, that may or may not be true," Joker nonchalantly said. "Ladies and Gentlemen, Hobos and Tramps, cross-eyed mosquitoes and bowlegged ants. I come before you, to stand before you, to tell you a story I know nothing about. One morning in the middle of the night two dead fellows stood up to fight. They stood back to back, facing each other, drew their swords and shot each other. If you don't believe my lie, it's true, ask the blind lady on the corner, she saw it too."

Yue and Nodoka stared blandly at him.

"Lame!" Fukawa said.

Joker sighed. "Okay, as I was saying, you humorless Philistines, once upon a time, from what I've been told, there was this great mage of yore, or yesterday, it wasn't that long ago after all, the Thousand Master, Man of a Thousand Spells. More like six spells, to be honest, but you know heroes, right? Always overrated and making shit up to look good! This guy went around knocking up women, including a Queenie Queen of Tsundereland, and then went against a poor ancient supreme sorceress who was just minding her own business and destroying the world so she could remake it. And then he kinda screwed up and defeated her, but she took over his body and not the funny sexy way, and then they buried them together down here. There's more to it, but that's basically the gist of the thing, according to what I've heard. I'm still trying to figure out whether it'll be necrophilia and slash or gay if we fondle them, what do you gals think?"

Fukawa blinked. "Okay. And what does all of that bullshit have to do with us?"

"With you?" the clown snorted. "Nothing, kid, you just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time! What, were you thinking this kidnapping was staged for your benefit? I was targeting the two library rats here, and your line just happened to be the only place where I know I'd find them eventually without the rest of their circle of friends."

"What?!" Touko cried. "Are you telling me I was incidental to all of this?! That you'd rather kidnap two no-name, unworthy generic fans over me?!"

"Former fans by now, I assure you," Yue droned while Nodoka nodded.

"At least Stephenie Meyer appreciates her fans!" Nodoka said. Everyone else winced at this scathing judgment.

"How little you know about the world!" Joker told Touko. "Now listen, Toots, you may be a big name in fulfillment dead tree book circles, and I'm sure your star power will go up as soon as the Syo movie is released after I kill you. I'm convinced your posthumous sales will be grrrreat! But, in the actual big scheme of things, these two tiny Moe things are way more important. Because they're friends to the Thousand Master's son, you see."

Yue frowned. "I call you out on that lie. There's no way that can be Negi-sensei's father."

"Why?" Joker asked. "Because there's no way he could've been buried under your school the whole time without your Headmaster knowing about it?"

"Yes!" Nodoka and Yue replied at once.

Joker hummed. "And because there's no way the Headmaster would know about it without telling your teacher, right?"

"Right!" Nodoka and Yue spoke together again.

Joker facepalmed. "No wonder you like a ten-years old boy. You're the same mental age!"

"That's rich, coming from a grown man who still plays with toys," Yue observed.

"They're highly deadly action figures!" Joker protested. "Besides, there's more to me than that! Geez, who do you think I am, the Toyman?!"

"All the same, if you're trying to make us doubt our Headmaster, and turn Negi-sensei against him through us, it won't work," Nodoka warned. "I don't know how you got this cruel, twisted idea, but all of this is clearly a staged set! Why would you have access to a magical place of holding Sensei has been unable to find for years, anyway?"

"You guys make my head ache," Touko grunted, an eyebrow twitched. "No wonder he wanted you, you're as delusional as him!"

"Shut up, Miss Collateral Damage," Joker warned. "I might change my mind and give you to Yomi to pass the time."

"Fools, the whole lot of you," Quartum finally spoke, still looking up reverently at the hooded figure, his chilling tone sending shivers up the girls' spines. Even the Heartless things gathered around Joker's legs moved nervously. "Can't you recognize true greatness when it stands before you? Even while trapped in this inferior body there's no mistaking the absolute power of Ialda Baoth, the Mage of the Beginning. The creator of the Averruncus line!"

"Turns out," Joker confided to the captives, "Quarty's kind of a Mama's boy."

"Am not!" Quartum protested. "I'm just paying due respect, not my fault if the word is an unknown to you!"

"Blah blah blah, nya nyaaa!" Joker taunted him. "Seriously, I can't wait for you and that little geek start squabbling over whether that stiff is your Mom or his Dad! That almost will be worth this whole time spent putting up with you!"

Yue sighed. "Fine. Let's say we believe you, and that is indeed Negi's father. Why are you telling us this? What was the point of bringing us here in the first place?"

Joker grinned maniacally, tapping his fingers together. "Well, that's the beauty of my plan in its simplicity. Without spoiling the whole of it, because I said I wouldn't do that and I'm a man of my word, you're here as bait, naturally. But the bait works either way. If Negi-boy fails to save you, his guilt will crush him forever, and I'll have won. If he rescues you, you'll have no choice but to tell him about this, then his faith on the system he's devoted his life to will be crushed forever. Sure, you might hold up for a few chapter, but as any CW show can tell you, eventually it's going to come up because you hero types suck at keeping important secrets! Either way I win! Hya-hah! How 'bout that for size, galpals?!"

"I don't get it," Touko confessed. "What do you have against this Negi person? He's still only a child, right? What could have he done to you? Or was his father who ever wronged you?"

"Uh, nope, neither of them ever did anything to me," Joker shrugged. "Didn't you say you 'd researched on me? What did you do, go to wikipedia? Since when did I need a special reason to ruin someone's life?"

Touko sighed. "I know, but generally, your plans to ruin lives of generic people who aren't connected to you are more general and widespread than this, aren't they? I mean, things like gassing whole cities and all of that. Aren't you going into too much of a specific tangent just for this random allegedly magical boy?"

"Oh, normally I would agree, but I was asked as a favor by the people who released me from Arkham," Joker said. "Now, I'm nobody's hitman or pest control, but the more I looked into this case, the more I grew convinced it'd be really fun, so... here I am!"

"So that's how it is," Yue ruminated. "Well, I'll admit we may come across as an... eccentric enough bunch for your tastes, but-"

"That's one fine way of saying you're all a bunch of Grade A oddballs and pedophiles," Joker grinned. "Sorry, pedophiles and an old man chaser. Seriously, this whole school is crazier than Arkham! Maybe I'll enroll after I'm done with this and if there's still someone alive, since I can't remember whether I ever graduated from high school or not..."

"I think you'd fit better in Honnouji, actually," Yue told him.

"Hey!" Touko cried. "Leave my alma mater out of this, will you, Airport Forehead?!"

"Uh, no. That place is too crazy for me," Joker said, "Even a Gotham boy like me has standards!"

"You're just doing this to piss me off, aren't you?" Touko said.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Ah, Chisame! And everyone else too! Thank God you're okay!" Negi breathed out with relief as soon as he saw his first Ministra walking into the meeting room, followed immediately by Matoi. Behind them walked Evangeline, Chachamaru, and a girl none of the other 3-A students present there had ever seen before, although...

"Wait, Madoka?! But how can you be over there when you're over here?" Misa cried out, glancing from the young woman who was having a vicious, silent duel of glares with Chachamaru over the annoyed Eva's head.

"That's obviously not me, Misa!" said Madoka, annoyed. "We don't even look that much alike! Look, her bobs are… well, we just look nothing alike!"

"The heck you don't! And how can I be sure she's not the real Madoka, and you're the imposter?"

Madoka just stared at her.

"See!" Misa finally said. "That's just the answer of someone who knows she's been caught in the act!"

"Oh, for the love of God, this isn't a time to be joking around at all!" Kugimiya snapped.

"That's never stopped us before!" Sakurako declared cheerfully.

Illyasviel nodded elegantly, walking in as well, prompting several gasps from Negi's gathered students and accompanied by Sayoko and a currently invisible Heracles. "Yes, I must say I agree with your unremarkable looking friend... Kumizuki-san, wasn't it? This isn't a time for someone like YOU to make fun of your desperate situation... I, on the other hand, still hold so many cards I'm sure to get a lot of fun out of this!"

Karin just stared at the lot of them. "Insanity," she finally declared. "I have stumbled onto a nest of insanity. That's the only reasonable explanation. This must be your doing, Kitty McDowell! You have perverted and corrupted the minds of these children, but all that is at an end! Face judgment eternal, Kitty McDowell!" She hefted up her hammer.

"I thought we had already settled out I'm the biggest victim of the insanity here!" complained Eva as Chachamaru blocked the hammer swing with a hand. "And stop calling me that already!"

"... 'Kitty'?" Ayaka echoed weakly. "Evangeline-san, who is this young lady, and why does she address with such a cute and intimate pet name?"

Chisame sighed. "Long story. But basically, she's Karin-san, some old ex of Eva's, whom she blames on some-"

"F-Forget about that!" Misa gasped, pointing at the smirking Illyasviel. "Why did you bring the White Kuro here?!"

"Oh, we're playing that game now, aren't we? Well, I might ask you why brought Miss Popularity here, then!" Chisame pointed at Mami. Then she angrily looked at Negi. "You did it, didn't you?"

Mami blinked innocently. "... I'm popular?"

"I did not!" the teacher claimed. "It's not something that can or should be blamed on anyone, but-!"

"But it's Yuuna's fault," Sakurako finished, pointing at the back of the room, where Yuuna was having a heated phone discussion with someone, peppered with some highly colorful language. "By the way, we think she's just found Caster. She's her dad's Servant."

"Not for long!" Yuuna promised before jumping back into her phone debate. "Well, then you go and tell him, like I'm scared! He's the one with explaining to do! Tell him I'm waiting for you two here! What? Me go to you? Why should I do that, it's not like you're my mother!"

Chisame blinked. "Aw, geez. Well, the world's a small place, isn't it?"

"A daughter's Deep Love can be as fearsome as any other, I suppose," Matoi observed. "I never saw the appeal of the Elektra Complex, since my dad's gone, but to each their own..."

"Okay, before we get to anything else... Chachamaru-san!" Negi commanded, clapping twice. "Please stop fighting with the Master's old ex!"

"That madwoman's no friend of mine, Boya!" Eva hissed. "Nor is she my ex-anything!"

"I'm terribly sorry, Sensei," Chachamaru said from where she was exchanging a quick flurry of strikes, blocks and dodges with Karin at the entrance of the room, "but even if Master has proven herself a treacherous, duplicitous, two-timing Mistress, I still must defend her from this enemy..."

"Then share her fate!" Karin said while kicking at her face, only to have her foot batted aside by a swing of Negi's staff. She angrily stared at him now, all the whole blocking Chachamaru's next punch with a forearm. "Who are you, boy, her other willing accomplice? Tell me now, then, how many of you must I fight to punish this wretched sorceress?"

"Wizard," Illya corrected in annoyance. "Sorceresses are something else entirely! Get it right, noob!"

"Hey, wait just a second here!" Misa stood up. "I'm not going to lift a finger for Eva-chan, but if you want to hurt Negi-kun, you'll have to literally pass through me first!"

Ayaka nodded firmly, already preparing her black whip. "Well said, Kakizaki-san! If this woman and Illya-san are the architects of our recent woes, we will prevail over them! After you!"

Illya rolled her eyes. "Gee, I try to kill you all once or twice, and then I become the cause of every bad thing that happens to you guys!"

Karin blinked. "What in God's name-"

Matoi slammed her fists together. "We would all fight to our last breath for our love of Negi-sama!"

"Oh, so you're cheating on me now?" Chisame said flatly. "That's it, we're done, I never want to see you again."

"Ah, I just love him Chisame-sama, it's no match for my DEEP LOVE for you!"

"Love... is a strong word," said Madoka. "But you're going to have to go through me, too, if you want to hurt Negi-kun!"

Sakurako nodded resolutely. "You said it, Madoka-chan! What are you going to do now, Bizarro Madoka?"

"Didn't you just hear? Her name's Karin!" Madoka growled.

Karin stood there for a moment, staring at the human wall separating herself from her current target, then turned to glance over her shoulder at Chachamaru and her weapon systems. With an annoyed sigh, she lowered the head of her hammer to the floor. "Insanity," she muttered.

"You act like you've never been through the education system before, this is completely normal," Eva said flatly.

"I can't really argue with that," said Negi, embarrassed by these developments. "By the way, Chisame, I thought you also were with-"

"We left Emiya-sempai, Saber-san and... a few others who joined in after you left at the front door, with Misora and Cocone, Sensei," Chisame dryly replied. A pause. "By the way, what were the bleached guy and those girls doing there, hmmmm?"

"It... It isn't bleach," Negi offered lamely. "Well, now, if we aren't going to murder each other anymore, we should focus on the most important subject at hand, which would be-"

"Negi-kun, Negi-kun!" Haruna frantically stormed in, flanked by Asuna and Satomi. "Nodoka and Yue have been kidnapped by the Joker!"

"...!" Negi went open mouthed, echoing the feelings of almost everyone else in the room, and then he whimpered very weakly. "On second thought, never mind what I was going to say right now, we've got ourselves a new priority."

Yuuna finally looked up from her cellphone, blinking. "Huh?" she asked. "Were you guys just saying something?"

* * *

 _The infirmary:_

"So, um," Ako swallowed, seeing Caster lowering the phone with an intense, fixed and vacant look in her eyes. "I assume things worked out in the end? Yuuna can be a bit headstrong at times, but she's a good-"

Karna quietly stepped in between Ako and the creepily silent and immobile Medea, pushing Ayaka and the Hakunos by the 3-A student's side and preparing himself to protect them to the best of his ability.

However, Caster ended up only exhaling loudly, dialing another number on the phone, and saying, "Hello? Why yes, it's me, who else could it be? Yes, yes, I know you're busy, but I believe this is important as well... Hmmm? Yes, she is fine. First person to ever call me a 'hag' more than once and still be fine, as a matter of fact..."

Ako flinched then, recognizing the sound of Akashi-sensei's voice, even if the scream he was giving right now was not like anything she'd ever heard from the soft spoken teacher. She couldn't make out the exact words, but she could deduce them quite well all the same.

"It's not my fault!" Caster kept herself calm but firm. "Things escalated out of control while you were away! First this other Caster and this strange, suspicious-looking Lancer entered our home out of nowhere..."

"Please don't talk about me as if I weren't here," Karna quietly requested.

Ako heard a few more jumbled gasps and demands from Yuuna's dad while Caster rolled her eyes. "Thank you, but of course I'm fine! Where am I right now? At the infirmary... No, not because of that! If I were wounded, this era's medical aid couldn't help me! No, it's not because of your daughter either! Her friend is here with me, however... The cutest one, yes..." She then glanced at Ako, offering her the phone for a moment. "He wants to ask you something. Do be brief and concise."

"O-Okay!" Ako gulped, taking the phone with shaky hands. "Ah... good morning, Sensei? N-No, I haven't seen her all day long, I think she must be with Negi-kun at the Haunted House, or else with Skuld-chan... Eh? N-No, no one's hurt me either, well, it's a long story, and it's been a VERY long morning, but... Uh-huh. Alright. I get it. Just a thing, please. Isn't Akira cuter than me?"

"She is sexier," Caster flatly said. "But not cuter."

Ako blushed at the quick, apologetic outburst from Sensei, who was no doubt blushing even more so right now. "Oh, no, no, sorry, I didn't mean to! No, Sensei, I didn't think those cuteness ranks were YOUR idea... No, I'm sure you don't- You know, Sensei, by now other people might start thinking you are falling into Suspiciously Specifical Denial territory..."

Caster looked at her manicured fingernails. "I'll readily admit I'm the one to rank you girls in terms of different kinds of appeal, but I cannot help it, I'm Greek! Although Wataru has never disagreed with my choices, and I suppose, were it ever necessary to spice up our relationship, I wouldn't be completely adverse to someday-"

"Too much information, thanks!" Ako said, slamming the phone back on Caster's hands while Karna, Ayaka and the Hakunos shuddered together. "Here, I was brief and concise, like you wanted!"

"Thank you, then," Medea nodded soberly, taking the phone back. "So, are you on your way? I'm glad. Sorry to disturb you like this. No, no, I'm sure our love will make it work, we'll successfully fight through this too. No, I wasn't flirting with her, I was just reassuring her I wouldn't act jealous of their proximity to our home, even if they are extremely pretty young things who would look very good in different kinds of cosplay and-"

* * *

Somewhere else, Takane and Mei, who had returned from the Headmaster's office just in time to see Akashi-sensei quickly excusing himself into the men's restrooms after getting an urgent call, blinked in surprise at hearing his latest gibberish scream, obviously highly embarrassed, from there.

The other cadets on duty at the monitor cabin shared knowing glances.

"No wonder he keeps that girlfriend of his well hidden," Yoriko observed. "Sounds like she's dynamite!"

Nene let out a whistle. "You know, I'm starting to wonder if he isn't a pervert himself. I mean, the way his daughter behaves, and now keeping that woman as some sort of recluse in his house..."

"Those are just ridiculous rumors!" Takane tried to lay the law down. "Sensei doesn't have any woman as a love slave in his house!"

"The neighbors say different," Yoriko smirked deviously, pushing her glasses up her nose. "That lady is a screamer, every night she's the same, going 'more, more, more prana', hee hee! Must be some sort of wicked roleplay...!"

Mei blushed very brightly, looking aside and twiddling her fingers together, while Nutmeg breathed heavily and tried her best to keep her attention on the surveillance screens. The fact there were people in swimwear in pretty much all of them was not helping, though. A few of them were inconsiderately having sex in front of the cameras, trying to be hidden about it and doing so very badly.

Takane hissed. "Now listen, that's just absurd, even if Sensei kept a secret lover, surely he'd have the good sense to set sound barrier spells around his house, much like me and M- ah- my husband would eventually do after we're married!" she hurriedly said while Mei hid her face in her hands, which right now were as red as the rest of her skin.

Yoriko, Nene, and even Nutmeg were all staring blandly at them now, clearly not fooled at all. "Seriously," Nene ended up saying. "I think it's time to leave that transparent closet already, girls."

"Don't you think we've tried?" Mei muttered out of the corner of her mouth, too low for Takane to hear.

Takane was about to give a furious reply that, fortunately for her, was interrupted by Sensei storming out of the bathroom and excusing himself away with the promise of a quick return before she could further bury herself and Mei. You'd almost think she wasn't American, given how repressively 70's Japanese her opinions were.

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **Omake: Don't Waste Your Time!**

"I know!" Negi said, triumphantly pulling Cassiopeia out. "With Chao's time machine, I'll travel a few hours back and stop the Joker from kidnapping Yue-san and Nodoka-san in the first place!"

"Wait, the what of who now, Sensei?!" Setsuna gasped aloud.

Chisame winced. "Um, Sensei, I'm not sure that's such a good idea..."

"Heh heh heh," Negi chuckled shakily, eyes spiraling slowly as his sweaty small hands adjusted the golden watch, "I think two hours should more than suffice to give us a safe margin, shouldn't it? Then let's see..."

"Haven't you been listening to what I'm telling you?!" Chisame protested, just as Negi activated the device and he was swallowed by a huge white flash...

* * *

"Ah, that's right, in my hurry to save Nodoka-san, I'd forgotten about you," Negi gasped right before Quartum, with a dry grunt, grabbed him by the throat and crushed it between his fingers.

* * *

"Okay, that didn't work so well," Negi admitted, rubbing his throat with a hand while adjusting the Cassiopeia with the other. "So this time, Illya, if you don't mind, I'm borrowing Berserker-san for help..."

Haruna looked at Chisame. "Is this how time travel is supposed to work? I mean, he was dead, wasn't he?"

"Don't sweat it too much, we're in an omake, you idiot!" Hasegawa chastised her.

* * *

"Berserker-san!" Negi gasped while Quartum grabbed his throat. "Now, if you please!"

Berserker nodded, then slammed his slab of rock down... right on Negi's head, splattering red chunks of his skull all over the blinking face of Quartum.

* * *

Illya pouted. "Well, you can't blame him! Your orders were 'make sure Quartum doesn't kill me'! So he did just that by killing you first, he's a killing machine after all!"

Negi sighed, readying Cassiopeia again. "Yes, now I see it was my fault... for trusting him in the first place! But now I've seen a window of opportunity! I'll strike while Quartum isn't around, right while the girls are being kidnapped!"

Setsuna blinked. "Um, Sensei, that still leaves my sister, however. Maybe I should go with-"

"I think I can take her on by now, Setsuna-san, I've trained a lot and there'll be no need to endanger you!" Negi smiled before disappearing in another flash of light.

Setsuna blinked helplessly, then growled. "What an idiot."

"Pretty much," Konoka agreed.

"No arguments from me," Chisame said.

"Hey!" Eva protested. "Are you morons doubting about my training?!"

"Well-" Matoi began.

* * *

"I'm sure I can do it next time!" Negi insisted while rubbing his chest with a hand and handling Cassiopeia with the other. Weird how phantom pain still worked even when you hadn't received your lethal wounds in the first place. "By now, I have her technique pat down! And I got several good hits in this time around, so-!"

"Just let me go with-!" Setsuna insisted.

"Thanks, but there'll be no need for that!" Negi insisted as he disappeared in another burst of light...

* * *

Against all expectations but his own, and against all laws of Negima canon progression, he'd barely squeezed in a victory this time, and now stood, bloodied and pantied and half-stripped but victorious and smiling, over Tsukuyomi's battered, and mostly stripped off, body. "I... I did it!" he gasped. "Okay, now the rest of you can just give up and-!"

Sailor Uranus simply slammed a gigantic mallet down on his head and that was it.

* * *

"... I'd honestly forgotten about that, stupid deviations from canon, but now I've got that figured out too, I'll see her coming and-" Negi grouched, frantically calibrating the watch again.

"Look, at least take Saber-san with you, I'm sure Emiya-sempai won't mind..." Chisame said.

"This is something I've got to do on my own, Chisame!" he insisted.

* * *

This time there was no pause, and right after finishing Tsukuyomi, he simply swirled around with uncanny speed and agility. He swung his staff around and knocked Sailor Uranus and Neptune off their feet and against a wall, knocking them out...

Then the Joker simply shot him through the head.

* * *

"Why, why didn't I think of it before...?!" Negi chuckled creepy and shakily, adjusting the watch with extremely shaky hands. "All I've got to do is going back even further, even before they run into the Joker in the first place, and stop them, not him...!"

"Well, I think you at least should be able to handle two socially awkward librarians who are very fond of you," Evangeline grumbled, folding her arms.

"I don't know, that actually sounds like the worst kind of weakness Sensei has," Chisame commented.

"Oh, stop pretending, you know very well I'm weak for you before anyone else, so will you stop acting jealous already!" When everyone around gasped in shock, but Karin, who just didn't give a shit, he only scoffed. "Yes, well, I said it, so what! I'm undoing this confession after I'm done anyway, so what's there to fear?" He then cackled derangedly and jumped back in time again.

* * *

"Nodoka-san, Yue-san!" he rushed to them before they could reach the library's entrance. "There's something I must tell you!"

They stopped and turned around, looking at him in mild surprise. "Y-Yes, Negi-sensei?" Nodoka asked. "What is it?"

"Um, well, you'll see..." Negi gulped, then smiled brightly. "Would you like to go out on a date right now?" he asked, putting his gifts of Casanova in action consciously for the first time ever.

After all, he told himself, what harm was there on this? He'd be able to restore things to what they were before this time, too...

 _Boom-chikka-wow..._

* * *

Tsukuyomi looked at her wristwatch. "Boss," she ended up saying, "I don't think they're coming after all..."

Joker hummed thoughtfully at this, then shrugged. "Doesn't matter. I have a certain feeling that, anyway, we've unleashed a great, apocalyptic evil upon this world all the same, heh heh!"

Touko managed to spit enough of her gag as to scream. "No one cared enough about coming to rescue ME?!"

"Quiet, new girl. Bad girls don't get appearances beyond their introductory chapter," Joker said.


	12. Meet Me Under The Tree

So, where exactly were we, anyway?

Negi Springfield, magical boy teacher extraordinaire, after undergoing a series of incidents including but not limited to being trapped in a global time freeze, meeting Queen Marie Antoinette and Sasaki (not related to Makie) Kojiro (or at least a wraith who got the Sasaki Kojiro name slapped on him by Regend- that is, sorry, legend), going on a completely innocent dinosaur date with his crossdressing cousin, and learning (technically relearning) one of his students is his Martian descendant from the future, has finally returned to the bulk of his students and allies only to learn two of them have been kidnapped by American mass murderer and creepy clown, Mark Hami– er, The Joker. This has all taken place, it should be noted, during a single morning that is ending only right now.

While this was happening, Fujimaru Ritsuka, a member of a magical organization from another dimension to save human history, has arrived upon this Earth with his Servants, legendary Heroic Spirits of yore including but not limited to Queen Marie Antoinette, the already mentioned wraith, King Arthur's female son Mordred, Blackbeard the Pirate and a cute intern from said organization, to stop King Solomon from destroying all that there is, ever was, or will be, including Milli Vanilli's career and those old Clutch Cargo cartoons. Currently he's kind of comatose after kissing the three already mentioned female Servants (including the one who is a man), plus the two greatest Yanderes in Japan's history.

At the same time, over in their home dimension, Ritsuka's morally questionable heroine(?) twin sister, Fujimaru Ritsuko, has allied herself with goddesses Urd and Ishtar to brave the dimension all of this inanity is taking place in to rescue her brother and his Servants, plus probably score with a few new cute things along the way.

The Joker has just kidnapped librarians Yue and Nodoka, plus book author Fukawa Touko of 'Genocider Syo' fame, to use as bait in a trap for Negi's team, the White Wings, and probably sell them to a deadly game show hosted by a psychotic robot plush bear afterwards. Or possibly host one himself, just to cut down on the number of character showing up.

King Solomon, the Grand Caster, while currently unseen so far, seems to have allied himself with the local spirit of Angra Mainyu, the incarnation of all the world's evils corrupting the Holy Grail of Mahora Academy, and they have infected several of Negi's students with something vaguely ominous and dark, oh noes!

Urd's youngest sister, Skuld, allied with Negi's descendant to reveal magic to the world behind Negi's back, is with her Ministra Magi Morisato Keiichi, Imouto supreme Yuuki Mikan and budding stage actress Murakami Natsumi, who has just learned secondhand from them about Negi's magic, on their way to meet up with Keiichi's own Imouto Megumi and his Motor Club partners. What they don't know yet is, Megumi and the others have picked up two tagalongs, both of them also Servants of Ritsuka- female pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read!

Negi's second oldest and definitely sternest Ministra Magi, Suzushiro Haruka, the Vice President of the Mahora Student Council, has been approached by members of a club she met while in Honnouji Academy (which defintely happened even though we technically still have to get around to writing it)- the Occult Club led by female demon Rias Gremory, who took Haruka aside to issue her an ominous warning that has taken this fucking long offpanel while everyone else went around killing monsters and making Provisional Alliances. It seems forces from beyond have taken a dark interest in the White Wings! Could this have anything to do with the Grand Caster, The Joker, the new Heartless creatures starting to roam Mahora, and Evangeline McDowell's old classmate from twelve years ago, Kitami Reika, who has returned to Mahora for the Festival...?

Oh, and that descendant, Chao Lingshen, is also scheming on the whole global magic reveal, too. I think she's still supposed to be the main antagonist of this arc, somehow. Eh. Well then, let's start, if your brain hasn't exploded by now...

* * *

You already know who owns what, and you know I don't own any of these characters. So let's skip that just this once, 'kay?

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Twelve**.

 **Meet Me Under the Tree**.

 _(Under the Tree! Under the Tree! Darling It's Better Down Where It's Wetter, Take It From Me!)_

* * *

"So, to recap," Suzushiro Haruka frowned, daring to glare in an almost hostile way at Rias over the large table, "your people is behind this."

"My people in the sense they are my race," the buxom redhead shrugged, to resulting 'boing, boing', while those in the tables around theirs minded their own business (except to pay attention to 'boing, boing'), a privacy spell turning the turns of their conversation into perfectly normal and unremarkable muggle static about, er, shoes or something. "Not that we agree with them, of course, or else we wouldn't be going out of our way to tell you this."

"Okay," Haruka sighed tensely. "Just one more question, then..."

"What is it?" Issei asked eagerly.

Suzushiro ignored him and asked Rias directly again instead. "Where's Yukino?"

Rias blinked. "Who?"

"Yukino, my best friend!" Haruka growled. "The girl who missappeared a month and a half ago! It was all over the news! Skuld-san she's in Mundus Tragicus, but she refusates to say anything beyond that!"

"I think you meant disappeared, Mundus Magicus, and she refuses," the small Koneko quietly said.

"That's part of her charm," Issei explained.

Rias frowned, rubbing her chin for a moment. "I don't remember hearing anything about any Yukino..."

"President," Akeno spoke, "there was a case, remember, about a student from CLAMP, another from Mahora, and another from Ohtori, who disappeared together in Tokyo Tower around that time. You told us to look into it just in case, we couldn't find anything, you said it was probably nothing important and that it was probably just an escape attempt to get out of those loony bins?"

"Nothing important?!" Haruka growled.

Rias took another sip from her latte. "We can't cover any and all cases of the unexplained in Japan, and we aren't a charity organization anyway, Suzushiro-san. Demons, remember? We're doing this favor to you for free because we think the repercussions might affect us eventually, but normally we'd be asking for your soul or at least itunes giftcards in trade for this kind of information."

"It's a very hot tip, after all!" Kiba nodded with a gentle smile.

"We could, however," Akeno added, "do an extra search for you on that subject. It'll only cost your immortal soul... Isn't that worth the sacrifice, for the sake of your best friend?"

Issei frowned. "Hey, now, she's a friend of mine, I won't stand for her losing her soul..."

"Well, I can probably get it down to three itunes giftcards and staring opposite Arimura Chika in a cosplay video…" Akeno said.

"Yes!" Issei said.

"We're not friends!" Haruka snapped. "You're just a perverse who latched at me after I gave you the most basic of courtesises!"

"Latched on you," Koneko quietly corrected, "and court-"

"If I ever need a dictionary I'll ask for it, thanks!" Haruka waved a hand. "Don't worry about me, I'm sure I can find Yukino through my own efforts just fine!"

"But Mundus Magicus is rather dangerous," Akeno casually tempted her, with a finger idly on her own lips. "It's populated with all sorts of mystical creatures, flesh eaters, Jack Rakan, tentacled beasts, sky pirates, Jack Rakan, serial fondlers like Jack Rakan, cannibalistic tribes, Fairy Tail members, Jack Rakan, Lina the Dragon Spooker, and ponies..."

Haruka blinked. "Ponies?"

Akeno nodded. "They're much tougher than they look, and some of them are quite demented. Why, there's the legend about the Pink One who Makes Cupcakes..."

"We aren't taking Haruka-chan's soul from her!" Issei growled. "Look, forget about the giftcards, just do the video…!"

"She might end up becoming another slave of our organization," Akeno casually mentioned.

Issei's eyes widened visibly, and then he smiled lecherously at Haruka. "On the other hand, becoming a servant of darkness isn't that bad, take it from someone who knows...!"

Haruka, without missing a beat, tossed the rest of her drink in his face, then told Akeno, "I still trust Yukino's capacibility to stay safe as I trust mine to find her on my own... no, on our own, with the help of Ala Alba! She's much more astuteful than she looks! I'm sure she must be doing fine for herself right now!"

* * *

 _Mundus Magicus:_

The creepily staring rival mage stared angrily at Yukino, while the badly beaten Gray, naked except for his boxers now, stood between them to further protect the terrified Earth girl. "And who," the blue haired shapely woman demanded, "is this female you care so much about?"

"She's part of my Nakama, of course I'd protect her!" Gray growled, his hands covered by spiky gauntlets of ice while Yukino gasped and cowered behind her shield. "What are you trying to imply, that she's my girlfriend or anything! Phe, as if it was any business of yours anyway!"

"True," icily conceded the blue haired mage, summoning several pillars of water by her sides. "I was just trying to find out if I should bury you both together... Mister Gray, was not it?"

A true gentleman, that. A shirtless White Knight in Nonexistent Armor, it was almost a pity having to waste him, Juvia thought. And that body, rowr...

"I think," Gray grumbled, giving a defiant step ahead towards his enemy, "she'd rather be buried next to her lesbian crush..."

"Sh-She's only my friend!" Yukino cried, blushing to her ears.

* * *

Haruka sneezed loudly, then rubbed her nose with a delicate snort.

"Gesunheidt," Akeno said.

"Thank you."

"Are you really sure you don't want to sell us your soul and become one of us, though?" Akeno insisted. "You're really likable, I can see why Issei'd like you..."

"Right! Right!" Issei nodded almost frantically.

Haruka stood up and clapped for the waitress. "They'll pay the check, I'm leaving now, thanks!"

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"I see," Lala said with a perfectly calm and even voice after being called into the meeting room and explained the basics of the librarians' situation. "So that's what happened. Well! It can't be helped, a consort of the royalty will be kidnapped often by those foolish enough to expect ransom or political leverage in trade!"

"I... I don't think the Joker's even aware Yue's engaged to you," Asuna pointed out.

Momo and Nana, who had come in with Lala, watched in concern as their sister began talking mostly to herself, oblivious to Asuna's words and gesturing with her hands. "Of course, the punishment for kidnapping a royal wife is a long, painful and torturous execution... that is, as long as the target has NOT been harmed... if a single hair on Yue's perfect head has been hurt, then the agony and torture will have to be extended at least ten times longer until the offender begs for a-"

"Lala-chan, we can think of the torture and execution later!" Haruna complained while Artoria held Shirou and Negi from behind so they wouldn't just race off to heroically rampage through the campus, a hand on their mouths so they wouldn't have to listen to their objections on the whole capital punishment thing either. Fujimaru, who had befriended Attila the Hun, Vlad the Impaler, Caligula, and Elizabeth Bathory (x3), and at the very least tolerated Bluebeard's existence, thought he maybe should be saying something in favor of letting the mass murderer be reformed and redeemed, but chose to let the Non Interference Clause dictate his actions just this once. "First tell us if you can help find Yue and Nodoka, that's why we told you this in the first place!"

A Zen-like state of perfect calm reached though white hot fury attained, Lala nodded. "Why, of course I can, Haruna! I planted a tracker on Yue's person for such eventualities!"

"My respect for you has just shot up, Hime-sama," Matoi said giving her a thumbs up.

Kiyohime nodded. "A tracker, of course! Why didn't I ever think of that before?"

Chisame cringed. "Don't tell me you left Ayase unconscious and inserted a tracking device into her! Seriously, Lala-san!"

"No, no, that would be unethical, Chisame. Yue hasn't given me permission to enter her body yet!" Lala shook her head. Then she smiled widely. "I just inserted nano trackers inside of each of Yue's hair ornaments! She always keeps her braids together with them, even while she's bathing, so I can always keep track of her at any given moment!"

"... I guess that's a bit better?" Asuna scratched her cheek. "I mean, Yue won't be too happy when she learns about it, but as soon as it saves her and Honya's bacon... Okay, and where's the gizmo you use to track her signal? Yo lost all your clothes not long ago, so you can't be keeping it on you..."

"Peke," Lala told the small brooch on her hair. "Start the tracking routine for Yue, please! Also run a subprogram for torture and execution while you're at it, okay?"

Mami winced. "This is all legal, isn't it?"

"It's all legit according to Deviluke Law, I think," Yuuna shrugged. "Don't think too much about it."

The brooch's small swirly eyes shone in golden for a few seconds before Peke's quirky voice offered the results of her search. "The Imperial Princess' been located! Her life signs emit stable readings, too! She is being kept under the landmark location Mahora inhabitants call 'the World Tree'!"

"Ah!" Lala sighed with a renewed smile. "What a relief!"

"Yeah, really!" Haruna shared her sigh. "I was really afraid- wait a second, how can that be?! There's no way they can keep anyone prisoner under the Tree! That's one of the most visited sites during the Festival! You must be malfunctioning, Peke-chan!"

Mami winced again. "The brooch talks, too? I... I'm not sure how to react to all of this, really, it's all too much, too quickly...!"

"That's the Curse of Ala Alba," Chisame said ominously. "Sorry, but your life's just been Ruined Forever."

"Oh, stop talking in Internet Memes, Drama Queen! It's not so bad at all!" Misa scoffed.

Negi managed to speak at last through Saber's fingers. "Maybe the Joker found the transmitter and tossed it there to throw us off his track!"

"Sorry, I should have been clearer, Princess Haruna, Professor Negi," Peke said. "What I meant is, the signal is coming from under your Tree... literally from under it! Deep underground, to be precise!"

"What?!" Evangeline gasped. "Are you serious, you piece of junk?! I've lived in Mahora for over a decade! I know all of its secrets! And this is the first time I hear anything about any underground chambers beneath that Tree!"

"Did you know about the secret chambers deep under Library Island before Chisame-sama went down there, Eva-sama?" Matoi asked hoping to prove a point.

"Of course I did, that's where Kitami Reika-" Eva began, then quickly closed her mouth.

Chachamaru, Karin and Negi quickly stared at their collective Master. "Who is Kitami Reika?" they all asked as one. Matoi noded in approval at their hitting the perfect 'jealous lover' tone on the first try.

"N-No one! You idiots!" Evangeline growled acridly, refusing to meet their gazes.

"The secret harem of Eva-sama keeps growing on bigger and bigger!" Sakurako whistled. "Eva-sama, you're a real player...!"

"Well, she's had ten years," Haruna said, nodding. "I wouldn't be surprised if half the previous class A's lost their virginity to Eva-chan!"

"I don't have a harem!" Evangeline slammed a foot down. "Listen, that's just someone I studied with twelve years ago, when I met some other idiots who fooled around with magic, and why aren't you morons going to save your stupid friends already, anyway!"

"They aren't my friends, so I have no problems whatsoever listening to that story over lifting a finger for them," Karin shrugged.

"Karin!" Eva told her. "Go with Boya and help him, he might need your talent for, well, not dying!"

"I've just told you I don't want to go!" Karin roared. "What, do you think these are still the old times and you can order me around?!"

"Just do it!" Evangeline seethed.

Karin blinked, then recoiled slowly and grumbled. "... okay."

"That was fast!" Madoka marveled.

"No, no, wait, how are you even going underground in the first place?!" Mami demanded to know. "Are you just going to dig some gigantic tunnel for you to-"

"Um, yeah, we can do that," Konoka nodded. "Paru once drew a giant drill vehicle and used it to infiltrate under a demon barrier while we were kidnapped by a Devil Count! It was awesome!"

"Damn right it was!" Haruna reminisced.

Mami grimaced, her face twitching, before opting to squeal out a weak "Okay..."

"I told you so," Chisame told her. "Your life's doomed, you fool! DOOMED!"

"Seriously, Chisame, the poor girl's having enough problems adjusting to this as it is!" Misa said. "You're only making it worse for her!"

Madoka and Sakurako blinked in shared shock. "Misa!" Madoka gasped.

"You're being the reasonable and sensible one in a discussion!" Sakurako added, just as stunned.

"Okay, maybe it's you who are being replaced by a doppelganger, and not me," Madoka observed.

"I think I may need new best friends," Misa sighed, putting an arm around the wary Mami's shoulders. "Would you be interested, Hon? We actually popular gals should stand together, you know..."

"Seriously, why do you guys keep on saying I'm popular?" Mami asked back. "The closest thing to being popular I can claim is Sasaki-san's non-scary mother stalking me on Facebook and the days she visits!"

* * *

"Suzushiro-kun!"

She heard the shout for her while on her way to the Haunted House, taking a shortcut through a wide green field free from wanderers and strollers (one of the reasons being it barely had any bushes to hide in to have sex. She chose to ignore the random people clearly having sex under blankets). They'd talked a few times due to Haruka's academy-wide administrative duties, but today he was sounding oddly more commanding and authoritative than usual. Her mind being so busy right now, this barely registered, however. It probably wouldn't have registered if her hadn't been busy either, since she used that time to worry about Yukino, but at least she has a likelier excuse now.

She turned around, frowning at the approaching man in a light shirt and working pants, who was being followed by an exotic-looking attractive woman in a black bikini. "Akashi-sensei," Haruka gave him a polite nod while reserving a look of distrust for the woman. She looked fairly familiar, but from where...?

"Where's Yuuna right now?" the man demanded, stopping shortly before the young woman in the white two-piece.

Haruka frowned, not sure what to think about this sudden curt tone in his normally gentle voice. Despite the appearances, Haruka was fairly smarter than she was given credit for most often, being an efficient organizer, and she quickly deduced he had learned at least a few things about his daughter. "I'm not sure, I was going to meet her, actuallity. I tried calling to rest and the rest of the Club, but- cellphones seem to have been working sporedly at best..."

"Sporadically," the strange woman calmly supplied.

"That's what I've just- Who might you be, anyway?" Haruka demanded. "As a part of the Committee, I am fully authoracted to question foreign elements on their presence at-"

"She's with me, that's all the explanation you need," Akashi sharply said, gesturing for the woman to follow him as he briskly marched ahead. He could have brought her along in her Spirit form, but he knew Yuuna would demand to see her as soon as they'd meet, and if that happened while in public, it'd make keeping the appearances all that much more difficult.

Haruka, who hated being brushed aside like that, vigorously stomped after them. "Akashi-sensei! I think I should remind you, it's bad for the students' moral involving oneself, as a public example, in secret relation-shippings!"

"You don't even know what's happening here, so please stay out of it!" Akashi retorted, not looking back at her while Caster pondered the situation in an intrigued silence.

Haruka bristled. "Well, maybe you'd do well to enbrighten me on the subject, then!"

"Nothing of your business, sorry!" the obviously incensed teacher said, about to reach the top of the small hill behind which the Haunted House waited.

"Sir!" Haruka said. "As a Secretary of Discipline for the English Research Society, and even a friend of your daughter, I believe I'm also entitled to...!"

"You, a friend of Yuuna?" Akashi huffed before sharply spinning back on his heels, facing Haruka. "Well, that's news to me, but maybe then you could start telling me about some of the things you all do behind closed doors!"

Haruka scowled. "What are you trying to imply here, Sensei?"

"Well, if anything, he's been too understanding about the whole situation," Caster intervened with a faux air of oblivious sweetness. "What with all of the rumors flying around the campus about that little club of yours, Miss..."

"Unknown factors of likely danger will stay silent!" Haruka said. Then the other shoe finally dropped and Haruka gasped, recognizing the face from Kuro-san's display at the Konoe home. "Wait... Of course you looked so dangerous! You're her! The divorced rebound wife Caster!-!"

Caster sighed. "They don't call this the 'Age of Information' for nothing, I see. The Age of Too Much Information, I 'd say... Tell me, young lady, how would you even know about my-"

"Please be quiet," her Master growled behind clenched teeth. "We aren't admitting anything until she does."

"Do you know what you're involving yourself into by associnating with that, that kind of person, Sensei?!" a livid Haruka pointed at Caster, who merely rolled her eyes around before tensing up. "You are literially bringing death itself to Yuuna-san's doorstep! Because she'll kill you! And then she'll kill her! Or the other way around!"

"I'm starting to think," Akashi protested, "that's something you girls and boys are doing already!"

"Master," Caster flinched, tugging on his sleeve.

"Far from it!" Haruka remained defiant. "If anything, we're helping her to stay safe and alive through the mined field that is this school! A place where, it appears, you would leave children in the dark about how dangerous, well, everything is!"

"Why yes, on the subject of danger..." Caster spoke.

"Not now, please!" Akashi and Haruka told her at once.

Caster frowned in such a menacing way her Master instantly regretted in tone and flinched back, although Haruka only sneered. A second later, however, the blonde stiffened in alarm as small black humanoid creatures, the very same kind who had vexed Tomoe Mami and accompanied the Joker before, literally began sprouting and breaking through the ground, sending chunks of grass everywhere, and making loud inhuman noises that were horrible to listen to as they rose all around the three.

"This is your work, I assume," Haruka icily told Caster while Akashi gasped, reaching for the wand in his shirt.

Caster shook her head. "I don't even recognize these creatures." Not from her time as a priestess and later witch, and not from any of the Maginet searches she had done since her summon, to better accustom herself to this alien new world. "I imagine you don't know them either?"

"I know what they're going to be. Dead," Haruka growled, as she brought her hands together and materialized her massive mace between them with a whisper of _"Adeat."_

Then all of the small clawed beings of darkness, with shrill mad yells, jumped directly for them.

* * *

 ** _Meanwhile, under the World Tree:_**

 _"I love you, Negi-sensei!" Nodoka proclaimed. "If it's all right with you, please b-b-b-b-be my boyfriend!"_

 _"I love you too, Negi-sensei!" Yue added. "Nothing would make me happier than if I could be your girlfriend... But! Um, I mean, I talked it over with Nodoka. And if you don't mind, maybe we both could be your- your-! Ah, I'm sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself! How silly of me. A-A-A-Anyway, um! I... I love you!"_

* * *

The Joker, Touko, the Heartless and Quartum were all giving Nodoka and Yue a bland, disapproving glare now. Yue thought it looked disturbingly like the face from that one Internet frustration meme taken from that American animated series Haruna liked so much.

Yue frowned, blushing intensely. "W-Well? What do you think?"

"Laaaaaaaame!" Touko cringed. Nodoka thought it was a bit disturbing she'd beat even the homicidal maniacs to make fun of their dreams.

Joker nodded. "Yeah, hate to tell you girls, but she's right, that's a lame-ass way of confessing. And then, what's supposed to happen?"

* * *

 _"Y-Yes, I know!" Negi gasped. "And I'm so honored, really! Thank you very much, Nodoka-san, Yue-san. B-But! I don't deserve it. I'm very flattered, but... it'd never work out, I'm sorry."_

 _Nodoka sniffled. "Yes. We know that, too. You love her."_

 _He bowed as deeply as he could. "That doesn't mean I dislike you or anything! I'm sure you'll make someone extremely happy someday, but, but...!"_

 _And then both of them placed their hands on his scalp. "Hush, please," Yue whispered. "That's okay. We understand perfectly."_

 _"It's all right, Sensei," Nodoka nodded with a beautiful sad smile. "Thank you for giving us a honest answer."_

 _"Yes..." Yue sighed. "That's a load off my mind. Now, however, don't you think you have something else to do...?"_

* * *

"And we'll finally drop on the grass as we see him run away from us forever," Nodoka said, moved to tears. "She'll reject him that day, because she won't be ready yet, but he never gives up, so eventually, he will get to marry her, and we always will be happy for him because of that..."

"Laaaaaaaamer!" Touko, Quartum and Joker said all at once.

Yue snorted, lifting her nose up. "You don't understand the frail, tragic beauty of a doomed romance!"

"Like hell I do, just because I've written that crap once in a while doesn't mean I support it in real life!" Touko argued. "If you really want that boy so much, who cares about that cold fish bitch, just run over her and get him for yourselves! Right, Joker-san?"

Their kidnapper nodded sagely. "Love is a war where you don't take any prisoners. Thinking otherwise is just foolish!"

Nodoka blinked. "You really think so?"

"Nodoka!" Yue said. "You're not going listen to them, are you?!"

"Well, we did ask for their opinion in the first place," Nodoka reasoned. "And for all their flaws, they still gave it fair and square, didn't they?"

"You know, I know this really stealthy and efficient killer for hire guy, Deadshot," Joker said. "Not a messy person like Yomi, as long as you pay him well enough he'll take care of that bitch for you, clean and precise, no track leading to you girls. Think about it, seriously. I think Harley has his phone number somewhere..."

"Your girlfriend has another guy's phone number on her and you aren't following your own advice on romantic rivals?" Yue had to smirk nastily.

Joker huffed. "They're just former colleagues who worked together for a short while, that's all... Regardless, he's already on my Kill List anyway!"

"Everyone's in your Kill List," Quartum reminded him.

"That's just a technicality!" Joker barked.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"Well, before we leave," Negi sighed with a fatalistic air of accepted annoyance, "I suppose some of you are going to ask me for a Pactio next?"

"Dammit, brat," Asuna said, "a moment like this, and all you can do is think about kissing women again?"

"What's a Pactio?" Mami blinked innocently.

And Negi sighed again. "Far from it, Asuna-san. However, I know I haven't made Contracts with a few of you yet, and I was reasonably sure those might offer themselves, even if unnecessarily, to help with this, for which you might think you would need a powerup..."

"Negi-sama, if I wanted a Pactio with you, I'd have asked for it long ago," Matoi explained. "I'm sure the natural strength of my DEEP LOVE is enough to protect you and Chisame-sama!"

"This rare moment, when the stalker speaks with the most wisdom of us all," Satomi hummed thoughtfully.

"Why would I do such a thing with you?" Karin acidly asked him. "I barely know you at all, and you don't look like a trustworthy leader to me."

"I see," Negi nodded, not really bothered at all by the insult. "How about you, Illya?"

"Your answer is going to be 'no' even if I threaten you with Berserker, right?" Illya guessed.

Negi simply nodded.

Illya smirked and shrugged. "I'll wait until you feel, ahem, properly motivated then! An Einzbern doesn't stoop low enough as to get scraps off the floor through mere trickery, after all!"

"I am very thankful for that," Negi sincerely said. He looked at Chachamaru next, the gynoid simply gaining a faint blush on her cheeks and looking aside in silence. He inhaled and added for everyone. "Okay, I'll take Chisame with me, since the Joker is bound to have technological and electronic defenses around his hideout. Chachamaru-san, I'd be thankful if you could come along as well, as support in that line as well as providing your firepower." While Karakuri nodded dutifully, he bowed. "My eternal thanks. We also need Haruna-san to pilot the drill vehicle, naturally, and I believe we could use Lala-san's technical expertise and fighting prowess, too."

"I'll be glad to help!" Lala grinned, although her expression looked a bit more murdery than usual. Rito muttered, not sounding all too happy, but made no actual protests that went registered.

"Thanks to you too," Negi nodded. "And of course, Karin-san is welcome to tag along, since Master wishes it so. So is Matoi-san, since let's admit it, she's going if Chisame's going. And Asuna as well, naturally, because of her anti-magic abilities..."

"I think that's not enough firepower to face my sister and Quartum, Sensei," Setsuna protested. "You know you can count with me, as well."

Negi shook his head. "Having you there would only spur Tsukuyomi to fight more fiercely, Setsuna-san. I'll summon you or Konoka-san if we need you at any point, but... actually, to take care of Quartum-san and Tsukuyomi-san, I'd like to know if we can be assisted by Saber-san, and perhaps, if I'm not asking for too much, by one of our new friends from Chaldea. Taking a bigger party along into unknown territory might be actually more dangerous than helpful, I believe."

"Sure thing, I'll go," Mordred easily offered herself.

Ritsuka blinked. "Are you sure, Mo-san?"

His Saber shrugged. "Why not? I'm not chickening out of going where Father and his boytoy are heading! The rest of you better start searching for that pillar already, it must be growing up a lot by now..."

Kiyohime sneered. "Finally, some common sense from you... Well! Since you are being reasonable this once, I'll wish you the best of luck, Saber!"

"She's only doing it to look better and gain more bond points with Master, tho'," Tamamo warned her friend-rival.

"I AM NOT!" Mordred slammed a boot down. "I just want to go kill jesters with Father, what son wouldn't like to do that at some point of his life or another?!"

"Yeah!" Lala said. "It was a favorite weekend activity of Father and I when I was little!" When she got several annoyed looks her way, she blinked cluelessly. "What? Clowns and the like are always creepy no matter the planet!"

* * *

 **Interlude: Inugami Kotaro**.

"Hey, Kotaru-kun," Abiru said as the three of them passed by a karaoke parlor, advertising several contests for the next few days. "Would you like to come here after your tournament's done?"

"Hmm? Well, okay, if that's what you want," the boy shrugged. "Mom always says I've got a good singing voice, so at least I know I won't be embarrassing myself."

"What's your favorite song, Kotaro-kun?" Harumi asked. "Something very traditional and Japanese, I'll bet!"

"Well, if I'm being honest, I'm really into an old American song right now," was his answer. "I can't figure out much of the lyrics, but I know it's a thrilling ode to being a manly man! It never fails to pump me up!"

Cocking a fist up, he sang in mangled English while drawing several looks from passersby, _"Macho, macho man, yeeeah! I gotta be a macho man! Macho, macho man, hey hey! I gotta be a macho!"_

Harumi and Abiru briefly stopped and gave him matching empty stares.

Kotaro stopped as well and snorted at them. "What? Not like I'm expecting a girl to understand, but-"

"Kotaro-kun," Harumi pushed her glasses up with a finger, "did you ever learn the band that sang that theme is a well known icon for the-"

Abiru quickly pressed a hand on Harumi's mouth. "- ultra-conservative, woman-demeaning hyper-macho community?"

Kotaro blinked, then scoffed and began walking away. "So what if they're fans of Jersey Shore? You girls make a fuss out of everything! Just because a guy's proud to be a guy and boasts about it, that doesn't mean we don't like girls or anything!"

While Harumi's mouth remained blocked, she stared angrily at Abiru.

Her bandaged roommate shrugged. "Even 3-F has to keep some standards, Haru-chan. We'd just crush the poor guy..."

Harumi kept on staring.

"Besides," Abiru added, "if he keeps thinking that way, there's a good chance you'll eventually see him and Negi-sensei singing that song together."

Now that was a language Harumi did understand, so she nodded and Abiru finally let go of her mouth.

* * *

Meanwhile, near the Haunted House, Haruka kept on grunting and smashing back against the increasing numbers of shadow creatures continuously spawning from the ground. So did Akashi-sensei, throwing blasts of magic all around him like a normal man would throw fireworks around... well, your mileage may vary on whether a man throwing fireworks in all directions at once could be normal to begin with, anyway.

It didn't seem to be working, and actually neither were Haruka's physical strikes and slams. Oh, sure enough, they would hit the little monsters invariably, and most often it would look like they were destroyed, but they regenerated just as quickly, and over the last few minutes they had been surrounding the trio more and more tightly, their ranks ever growing; clawing and slashing, they had left several red marks across the humans' legs already, and each time they would hit higher. Caster was not being of much help either, not that Haruka was surprised; even if she wasn't behind the attack in the first place, something Haruka was still suspicious about, she had overheard Kuro-san once mentioning Casters tended to be as useless in direct combat as they came...

The woman, so far, mostly seemed to do little but standing there with her eyes closed, holding a large curved dagger before herself and softly chanting under her breath. Haruka chose not to dwell on where she'd been keeping that weapon the whole time (the actual answer being she had just summoned it as soon as the conflict started, actually) and instead yelled at her, "Hey you! If you can do something about this, do it now, will you?!"

"... How bothersome," Medea muttered with a firm clench of teeth before her eyes grew fully open again. And she all but shouted, defiantly. _"Noble Phantasm! Rule Breaker, Breaking All Charms!"_

"... what?!" Haruka screamed, before Akashi simply took hold of her and pulled her down roughly with himself, trying to shield her with his body. A second later, she swung the dagger in a clean arc around herself, and all Heartless shuddered abruptly, collapsing to wobble knees and letting out hideous cries the likes of which Haruka had never heard before.

Then the Caster made a hard smile. She shook her hand, replacing the dagger with a long ornate staff that appeared between her fingers. A wide purple cape settled around her shoulders, unfurling like demonic butterfly wings on her back, and she rose several feet above the ground quite quickly, while half a dozen of glowing magic circles manifested themselves, floating around her. Taking aim with her staff, the sorceress pointed down and laughed briefly, blasting down at the fiends with several blasts of magical bombardment that dwarfed Akashi's and left Haruka open mouthed.

Even so, Haruka's sense of duty remained the same through her awe, and when it was all finally over, she was the one now covering Akashi with her body, the teacher surprised at how strong this young lady was, and how she'd kept him sfaely pinned under her after turning the tables on him. Mostly unhurt, she rose back to stare at Caster as the Servant slowly floated down to her feet, the wings disappearing again, the woman elegantly pulling her hair back with a twirl of a wrist.

"You're strong, for what I expectered of you," the Vice President admitted.

"Servants, even the weakest ones, are much stronger than the average mankind has to offer these days," Caster said coldly, her tone growing much warmer as she walked past Haruka and helped Akashi back to his feet. "Are you okay? Sorry it took me so long, but you know how it is..."

"It's okay, thanks. Sorry for not being a stronger Master," he softly apologized, hugging her and patting her back while the last dispersed black specks of the obliterated Heartless fluttered away in the breeze. "How did you-"

"I deduced out, from their obviously alien nature," Medea observed clinically, "that they were bound to this world through an area effect magic from whoever their Master is. Through Rule Breaker, I struck at the field itself that kept their existence here steady, and then I simply finished them as I saw fit."

"And you couldn't have done it the other way around?" Haruka said. "You know, cut them off AFTER you blasted them to bits?"

"… no, of course not," Caster said, suspiciously not making eye contact. "I-If that were possible I w-would have done it that way! Certainly!"

"I see," Wataru nodded in understanding, giving her shoulders a reassuring squeeze. "Just like I expected of you. Your keen eye for strategy is unmatched indeed..."

Yuuka had passion and unmatched drive while plowing through the battlefield, but Medea's observation and analysis of the field was just as effective in its own way. Akashi smiled sadly at himself over the comparison he couldn't help but making in his mind. Truly, he'd been blessed with great women to fight by his side, even if he wished the need for fighting would just disappear already...

 _Somewhere in Chaldea, Emiya Kiritsugu didn't sneeze, but he did shudder ominously._

"Well, yes, that was impressionative enough, I guess," Haruka grunted, letting her morningstar rest by her side at last. "But I doubt you're half as strong as Saber-san."

Caster and Wataru immediately gave her alarmed looks. "You've met the Saber of this War?!" the teacher demanded.

"YOU'VE met her, Sensei!" Haruka said. "She's... well, Saber-san!"

Wataru blinked. "... you mean... Negi's newest student?! Einzbern-kun?!"

Haruka groaned. "You mean you didn't know? After her first name's Saber and her family name's Einzbern?-! The only way it could have been more obvious was if she walked around waving a sign and challenging people for the Holy Grail, and only because he talked her out of it!"

"In my defense, it'd be just like the Einzberns naming one of their children after a Class," he argued. "I've always heard they're insanely obsessed with the Grail War. And that they had an albino fetish."

"Okay, you might have a good point there," Haruka admitted, rubbing her chin and thinking of Illya and- "Ah! By the way, we've also met the Temptress, the Berserker, the Rider, the Lancer, the Monster and the Vigilante! And Chachamaru allegedly met the Trickster."

"Vigilante? Temptress? Trickster?" Wataru flinched. "Is there a Class named like that, really?"

"Much like mankind itself, Grail Wars have greatly degraded over time, from what I have gathered," Caster mused aloud. "There's actually a Class called 'Bob' of all things."

Haruka nodded. "He's a talking duck."

Caster frowned in disgust. "Aren't you sure that's not a swan? Zeus might be trying to infiltrate your ranks, and assuming that shape might give him enough of a chance to sneak into a Class container despite his divinity. He might have impregnated you already."

"He's a duck, he's no god or swan at all, and he's definiotely not impugnated me!" Haruka protested.

"Why would he impersonate a duck when he can just impersonate Negi?" Akashi said. Haruka nodded in agreement.

Caster shrugged. "If you say so. Then, Yuuna's newest classmate is a Saber? What a fiendish way to hide in plain sight. Are you sure you aren't leading me to her to dispose of me?"

"I hadn't thought of that yet," Haruka said, "but now that you mention it, that's not such a bad idea..."

"She's just saved your life!" Akashi angrily pointed out.

"Sorry, maybe I've spent too long around McDowell-san and Saotome-san of late," Haruka apologized.

* * *

 _Under the Tree:_

"There's something wrong," Quartum declared then, standing from his sitting position on the floor and keeping his eyes fixed on the figure resting within the coffin-like construct.

"My favorite sentence in the whole world, right after 'Mark Hamill As'," Joker grinned again, while the Heartless around his legs grew restless, flexing their claws and sharing quick, eager glares with each other. Nodoka and Yue had the bothersome impression the Clown Prince had actually been waiting for something like this... whatever it was... to happen. "So what it is, Quarty?"

"I'm not sure," the Averruncus unit said. "But suddenly, I felt a pulse of sorts beating inside of the Master's chest. Not a heartbeat, and nothing I had ever felt before. But, I had the impression it... didn't belong to her."

Joker caressed his long, pointy chin with a hand. "Maybe it's the host body acting up? I suspected we'd be disturbing Sleeping Beauty's rest if we settled shop here."

"Then why didn't you say so before?" Quartum asked.

Joker shrugged. "Because I like it when things go off the rails, duh?" He stepped closer to the gigantic capsule, tapping on its surface with his cane. "What's the problem, my good man? Struggling with your literal inner woman? Upset stomach? I haven't started redecorating your tomb yet, so that can't be it..."

Touko tried to get a better look back over her shoulder. "Is that... thing really alive after all?"

"Who knows," Yue had to confess. "He looks very well-preserved, and someone like Sensei's father wouldn't die so easily, so I suppose it's entirely possible he's been in some state of suspended animation all these years."

"He had to have been active five years ago, didn't he?" Nodoka wondered, remembering about the vision of Negi's past Haruna had told them about. "I, I have no idea how they'd bring him here back then without any of us noticing..."

"That," Temptress said, appearing out of thin air by the chairs' side, but ignoring the girls and coldly addressing Joker instead, "is a sign of him becoming a Demon Pillar."

"Temptress-san!" Nodoka gasped, trying to edge away from her as best as she could,

"So this is that Servant you spoke about after Kyoto?" Yue frowned, taking a good look at Temptress' small cute face. "Weird, she looks kind of familiar to me too..."

Temptress deigned them with a tiny cocky smile. "Well, you always were one of the most perceptive ones, Yuecchi. Weren't you?"

Yue lifted an eyebrow. "Do we know each other?"

"Oh, now we do," Temptress smiled sultrily, reaching over to gently caress her cheek with a hand while Nodoka bristled and Touko made a rather funny face. Before the blushing Yue could do anything but gasping and stuttering, Temptress pulled the hand away and walked towards Joker and Quartum. "As you'll remember, I've made a point of gathering information about the multiple timelines phenomena from when I... was alive. There was an... occasional ally, sometimes enemy, to us back then, who hailed from an alternate timeline herself and had cataloged several of them along her travels. At some point, I... appropriated her research and even expanded on it as best as I could," she lightly chuckled, Quartum eyeing her carefully as she slowly encircled the Lifemaker. "And in at least one of those doomed timelines she once escaped from, there was a global attack from entities known as Demon Pillars, the devils from Ars Goetia, the slaves of King Solomon. It makes sense now, doesn't it, they'd use the greatest mage of this era as a vessel for the local servant of the Greatest Mage of History."

Quartum huffed. "There's never been a greater mage than the Master!"

"Then how come she's twice trapped, within her greatest foe and then buried under a mere school?" Temptress taunted him, rapping her small knuckles on the tank. "Anyway, I've been monitoring this being while you wasted your time entertaining the hostages, and even before you realized it, I got slight readings of power clearly demonic in nature. Those weren't there when we first arrived here, and they started around the same time I also got readings of several new Servants popping up all over Mahora. This only can mean what 'that girl' once cataloged, the incursions from beyond by the Ars Goetia."

"Mind translating all of that for those of us who are not chuuni freaks caught in your complicated roleplay?" Fukawa asked.

"Shut up, you're nothing but an incidental hostage," Temptress sniffled her way, not bothering to tease her. "Explanations are wasted on the likes of you!"

Joker chuckled Hamilly, tapping a foot down. "I see! Well, it sucks to be you, Tempy. You barely stood a chance of winning this Grail War thing when there were only, oh, two dozen other Servants around, and now there are even more of them to block your way? I'd feel sorry if I were that kind of guy, he he."

Temptress waved a hand nonchalantly. "Never mind that, I'm sure we can manipulate them into attacking each other so we only have to pick the pieces up. I'm more worried about the Demon Pillar itself. Those demonic beings were created to raze mankind and destroy history and civilization themselves."

"And the bad part about that is...?" Joker asked.

"They won't be making any exceptions with us, that's your bad part right there," Temptress scoffed.

"Still not seeing a downside," Joker said.

"They'll destroy all the Klondike bars," Temptress sighed, rolling her eyes.

"BASTARDS!" Joker suddenly roared.

"Okay," Touko frowned, "I think I get it now, somewhat, despite you being secretive assholes to me. Basically, there's some sort of creature named a Demon Pillar... why you'd call it a Pillar when it's a living being is still beyond me though... lurking within that hooded man, in addition to the lifeform of the undead female mage you mentioned before. And now, that Pillar creature is starting to stir up and soon will try to kill us all, right?"

"Riiiiiight," Temptress nodded, basically unfazed and still looking at the Mage of the Beginning's silent and still frame. "Maybe you should've been a fantasy writer instead of devoting yourself to thrillers, you know?"

"Actually, I've been in talks with my editors about that," Touko admitted. "Anyway, then the course of action is clear, right? Just kill that thing before it wakes up! You're all deranged killers, right? Why aren't you killing it already?!"

"Because even to us, it's all but impossible to kill, that's why, idiot," Temptress sneered. "Yes, even you, Joker-san, so please put that thing down at once. Honestly, can't you think of a different cliché?"

Joker growled, still stubbornly holding the growling and huge chainsaw he'd just turned on up. "Who are you, my mother?" There was a pause. "No, seriously, are you? One never can be sure with you Servants..."

Temptress rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Even if we could break through the containment unit in the first place, which we can't, that'd only wake the Lifemaker up, most likely. Maybe she would spare Quartum, but she'd have no use for the rest of us, and that'd be if she were running the show within Nagi Springfield's head. With a Demon Pillar thrown into the mix, she wouldn't spare even him... we're all things to be annihilated equally, and there's no reasoning with that kind of entities."

Joker let out a long whistle. "Izzat so? I think I'm in love."

"Harley and Batman will be so sad to hear you're cheating on them," Temptress snarked.

Quartum tightened a fist. "Will the indignities against Master never cease? First mankind does this to her, and now... now this?!"

"Well," Yue told Temptress, "if you're the expert on this subject, what are you going to do about it now?"

"I'm not sure," Temptress confessed casually. "I guess it doesn't matter much to me either way, once you're dead and then your plan upon revival relies on massive eradication these things don't make much of a difference anymore, but even so... I'd rather prefer it if I could find a way to save my Master, at the very least."

Nodoka blinked. "You mean Joker-san is NOT your Master?"

Joker and Temptress cringed fiercely at the same time, and then cried at her, _"I'd never been so insulted in my whole life!-!"_

"S-S-Sorry...! I just, I just assumed...!"

Temptress snarled and handed Joker the chainsaw. Joker wordlessly revved it to life. Quartum, in a rare moment of sanity, melted it out of his hands.

"Stop being so loud, you'll interrupt the Master's rest!" he said.

* * *

 _Somewhere, sometime else:_

"Something's definitely wrong here," Astolfo, the Pink Trap Rider of Black, if that denomination makes any sense, said as he looked all around, his gaze sweeping over the scorched land they'd been transported onto as he made a 'thinking' face that would have done Winnie-the-Pooh proud.

"No, seriously?!" Fujimaru Ritsuko growled, slamming a boot down on the head of the latest darkness demon Nero had just pinned against the ground with her sword. "Well, thank you for the qualified opinion, no wonder my brother feels so close to you!"

"R-really?-!" Astolfo said happily. "Master said he feels close to me? YES!"

Around them, the rest of the landing party were just finishing the group of monsters that had attacked them as soon as they manifested themselves there. Boudicca was bashing what remained of a still-twitching black snakelike creature into the cracked ground, huffing roughly. Artoria Alter swiftly beheaded a winged wraith that had descended upon her moments ago spitting fire, the King's beautiful face betraying no emotion whatsoever. Charles Babbage's gigantic armored frame towered over several fallen imps, holding two of the remaining few by their heads and then bashing them together, crushing them into nothingness. Standing on an already cleared patch of the devastated neighborhood, Helena Blavatsky and Da Vinci conferred together while taking readings of the surroundings, hunchbacked over a few handheld measuring instruments and heatedly discussing the meaning of what they were currently showing.

Now that Ritsuko thought about it, she should have imagined shit would be this bad as soon as Da Vinci, after performing a few last minute analysis of the Singularity, made the last moment decision to accompany them into it, something that hadn't happened since Camelot. The rest of the in-site team was made of Nitocris and Raikou, who held together back to back eliminating a few stubborn gigantic beetles by a toppled building, the Berserker Vlad and Avenger Kotomine who had already cleared their sector up and currently studied the burning horizon line carefully, and the Rider Medb and Demon King Archer, who shared many a good cruel laugh as they crushed the dark twisted vermin currently fleeing them.

All in all, a team mostly fitting Ritsuko's... quirks and special needs. Of course, what she needed the most right now was an answer to the question she was currently screaming to the reddened skies. "Why, oh why is this, I ask you, Kami-sama?! I was promised this Singularity would be overflowing with great looking people in swimsuits! Your daughter told me I'd be enjoying a grand school festival, unlike all those crappy ones we had back at home! Why have you forsaken me...?! AND WHERE'S MY EGGPLANT?-!-?-!-?-!-?"

And then there were those two Ritsuko didn't consider part of the team (mostly because they still refused to be cozy with her) but had come along anyway, the two self-proclaimed goddesses, who were standing on a pile of rubble confering in secretive, urgent whispers among themselves. Urd, however, took a moment to gesture for Ishtar to wait a second, and then shout down at Ritsuko, "Aren't you concerned in the slightest about your brother, girl?!"

"Of course I am!" Ritsuko huffed, pouting and folding her arms. "But I know in my boners he's still alright, okay?! It's a twin thing! The Twin Sense, you'd know if you had one!"

After dislodging the last short demon stuck in her blade and kicking its body aside, Nero smiled and caressed her Master's shoulder. "Praetor's brother is a survivor indeed, I am sure we shall find him close enough! Rest easy, Master, since as long as I stand by your side, conquest of this realm is guaranteed!"

"Hm," Ritsuko huffed, frowning. "You know, this place looks almost identical to the burning Fuyuki. You sure you didn't send us to the wrong Singularity somehow, Sensei?"

Knowing the question was aimed at her, Da Vinci looked away from the other Caster and towards the young Master. "That is possible, I suppose, although impossible to confirm until we regain our connection with Chaldea. But I doubt it regardless. Our readings seem to match those we got from the Singularity destination before we Leyshifted, but-"

"They are somewhat altered," Helena completed the thought for her. "This Singularity seems to be trapped in a complicated state of temporal alterations interrupting and disturbing the normal flow of time, and endless recursion of time if you will. Most specifically, despite aiming for an arrival minutes after Ritsuka-san's, I think we arrived three full days after, instead."

"I don't understand a single thing of what you've just said!" Nobunaga growled. "Talk like a normal person would, wench!"

Blavatsky sighed. "What's so hard to understand? I've phrased it as simple as I could! Time's all out of shape in this Singularity, most likely because of the Crisis it's experiencing, so we're out of synch with Ritsuka-san's team."

"How so?" asked Boudicca. "If I'm understanding you correctly, they still should be somewhere around here, right? They shouldn't have fallen yet even if the situation has worsened over those three days. Not with Karna, Beowulf, Tamamo-no-Mae and Mashu-san in their ranks..."

Nero nodded. "The fox queen is my worthy rival, after all. It would take something able to take me down to defeat her, and so far this Singularity's challenges have proved themselves woefully unfit."

Ritsuko rolled her eyes exaggeratedly. "What have we said about teasing the Fates, Nero-chan?!"

"But Praetor, the Fates must be smiling at us as we speak!" the Red Saber protested. "For once, our ranks were not scattered all across the place upon arrival, saving us a lot of time!"

"No,we're not!" Urd called down to her. "We've got better things to do!"

"Yes, well, I'd say that's countered by how we've fallen in the middle of a post apocalyptic wasteland!" Boudicca argued, a grand arm motion sweeping along the view of the devastation. They were standing on something that had once been a massive city of sorts, but had been savagely ruined recently, by some sort of hideous cataclysm or another. A gigantic once proud tree stood weakly in the distance, its burning silhouette now more akin to that of an overgrown dying matchstick against the red skies. "It would look like the Grand Caster already prevailed in this Singularity!"

Urd grunted, approaching them with a grim expression and followed by a much more casually sedate Ishtar. "Yes. Yes, that would seem the case, wouldn't it? Perhaps I've lost both of my sisters now. In which case, however, I swear my revenge will be a-"

"You must be Urd-sama, right?" asked a female voice coming from the wreckage, where a short figure wrapped in a concealing dark cloak and hood now stood, facing the Servants and the blinking Master. The Heroic Spirits armed themselves and grew ready to do battle again, all other enemies in the area vanquished. "Whoa, whoa, stay chill, will you? I mean you no harm, seriously! I come in peace! Live long and prosper! May the Force be with you!"

"You're not a Servant," Da Vinci coldly noted what the rest of her fellow Legendary Souls were also feeling. "So who are you, and how are you connected to this?"

"Don't start thinking I'm at fault here, now," the stranger said. "I arrived rather recently, myself. Like the little purple-headed brainiac said, time's acting all wonky here, and I'm living proof of that... well, one of the last few living anythings around this place now, as a matter of fact!"

Oda Nobunaga hissed viciously, aiming her weapons even more intently at this mysterious person. "Cut that crap before I cut you down, you little piece of excrement! You were asked a simple question, so give a simple answer! Who the hell are you?"

"I don't think my name will mean anything to any of you," the stranger said. "Suffice to say, three days ago, your friends failed to stop this world's Demon Pillar from waking up. It slept under that tree," she pointed towards the burning giant past the smoking streets and buildings, "and when it revived, nobody was spared. It's too late to change that now. In hindsight, it was probably a bad sign when the first thing Ritsuka-san said when he saw it was 'at last, the sweet embrace of death!'."

Astolfo, Urd and Nitocris gasped as Nobunaga, Nero, Medb and Vlad simply sneered at the stranger's somber words. "Then why are you here?" Medb asked. "Because it sure looks like you knew where to find us to me, and you know even who we are supposed to be, from what you are implying. How can that be, when you are no Servant yourself?"

"200 Mana Prisms on them being another Assassin in disguise," Ritsuko said. "We need more Assassins around here, poor Koji-chan is getting overworked killing all those dragons…"

"I said it's too late to change that now," the stranger said, reaching into her clothes and pulling out a shiny, if badly beaten, golden watch attached to a long chain out. "But there's still a chance things can be changed in the past. Believe me, I should know." She lowered her head slightly, part of a lock of golden hair peeking out through the hood. "I've seen the big picture from the outside, after all." 

* * *

Three days before that, Karin flinched uncomfortably all of a sudden.

Negi looked back at her after helping Chisame into Paru's large drilling machine, stationed behind the Haunted House at an angle where visitors entering from the front wouldn't be able to see it. Not that it mattered, since they could have just passed it off as Festival Stuff. "Something wrong, Karin-san?" he gently asked her.

"I'm not sure," the immortal admitted grumpily, rubbing herself up and down an arm. "I may not be able to ever die, but I still feel like someone's just stepped over my grave, somehow..."

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **Omake: The Insult that Made a Superpowered Shounen Hero Out of Negi!**

While sitting by the beachside on a towel, Negi and Chisame are enjoying a quiet afternoon under the sun when suddenly a few girls playing ball run past them, kicking sand on their faces!

"Hey!" Negi cries. "Stop kicking that sand in our faces!" See, it did happen like that. Would I lie to you?

"That freaking albino is the worst nuisance on the beach!" Chisame cries. "Well, other than Haruna... and Chamo... and the Occult Club guy from Honnouji... and Tsukuyomi... and that creepy priest and his arrogant boytoy... and-"

Negi goes to confront the rowdy leader of the band of girls like a gentleman, but his genteel observations are only brushed aside!

"Listen, Negi Springfield," the one-piece clad Sextum monotones in his face. "I would smash your face over this insolence... but you're so weak it could simply make the skin and flesh blow off your skull. And that would be messy."

As she walks away from the stunned boy, her female friends gather around her, clapping and giggling giddily.

"You showed him, Sextum-sama!"

"Ah! Sextum-sama is so cool!"

"Let me rub some suntan on you, Sextum-sama!"

"Please let's build happy summer memories together, Sextum-sama!"

Negi sniffles with a heavy heart, going back to his beach umbrella. "I have failed as a teacher and authority figure again...! But I'll get even some day, even if it takes 200 more chapters!"

"Oh, don't let it get to you, little boy!" Chisame sighs.

* * *

Back in his room, a frustrated Negi resorts to the arcane arts of the Maginet in his search for forbidden knowledge!

"Darn it! I'm sick and tired of being an underachieving action shounen lead! I'm still too much of a wimpy harem lead! I don't want to remain a Keitaro forever! I need some narrative cheat powerup to render the rest of my cast irrelevant, like a Bankai and Hollow combo, or a storybreaking Devil Fruit, or a set of transformations where my hair grows longer, spiky and glowing, or a rampaging beast sealed inside of me, or the 'One For All' Quirk! Ah! Evangeline Mc Dowell says she can give me a REAL immortal body, all right! I'll gamble a stamp and get her FREE book! Wait, if she's announcing her in the Net, why not to put an e-book for download instead? Hm, get a bigger penis? What good is that in a fight? Pass!"

Regardless of the motives of an arcane witch addicted to modern and vintage videogames alike, in a short time Negi has achieved a lean, fit muscle mass only surpassed by the children of Dragon Ball Z! Now he poses shirtless before a mirror and flexes his biceps, smiling proudly at his image! Exclamation points!-!-!

"Boy! It didn't take Charles Atlas- I mean, Master Evangeline to do this for me! And all it took were months of Training from Hell, dying twice, losing my humanity and virginity, and completely ruining the power balance of my series! At least I didn't lose that virginity to Charles Atlas, that might have been awkward!"

Next Beach Episode, Negi goes to confront Sextum again... but this time he's ready for her!

"What?" he growls at her. "You're here again? Don't we have any other End Bosses in this manga, other than the hooded guy who always drops in a single chapter? Here's something I owe you!" he says, socking her in the face.

"Why am I crucified to this glowing bubble in the middle of the beach?" wonders a nearby bikini-clad Asuna.

Now, however, Negi has no answers for this Baka! He's too busy basking in the admiration of the girls around him!

 ** _HERO OF THE MANGA_**.

"Gosh! You sure showed Sextum-sama, Negi... sama!"

"Please make us your disciples now, Negi-sama!"

"I'm interested in performing a sudden turn from the path I have been obsessively following during my whole life just because you gained me over to you by landing a punch on me, Negi Springfield," Sextum monotones to him. "Please take me savagely right here and now."

"Oh, Sensei!" Chisame sighs. "You're a real MAN after all!"

"Does it mean you'll be my girlfriend now?" he asks.

"Ew, of course not. You're still a kid!"

"Oh well, I won't be able to give you any children anyway."

"... say what?"

* * *

YES! Let me prove you I can turn you into a real man! Or a corpse most likely, but like anyone'd miss a weakling like you, right? No risks, no gains, Boyas!

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My 'Magia Erebea' training program will give you power beyond your wildest dreams, FAST! Just ask our only surviving happy customer! Don't waste your time and money with Pocket or Digital Monsters, Hearts of the Cards, Black Bibles, Detective Toys, Quirks, dragons sealed in your arm, or Kampfer bracelets! All those inferior methods are flaky and unreliable, and a few of them will literally turn you into a girl!

Don't delay! Become a leading Shounen Action lead, and eventually you'll even get your own terrible animated adaptation! What are you, a filthy and spineless coward? Are you going to let a child be more courageous than you? Call now, you idiot!

* * *

Legal Warning: Evangeline A.K. McDowell is not a legally sanctioned magical trainer, but the Clock Tower, the Fang Tower, Ariadne Academy, Hogwarts, the Atlas Institute, and the Kansai and Kanto Magic Associations have all failed to stop her, so she might have something to teach you regardless.

Subscribe now, and you will receive your own clone with shared genes from Kagurazaka Asuna, Princess of the Twilight.


	13. It's Good to See You Again

Suzushiro Haruka looked down the huge hole in the ground behind the Haunted House.

"Why didn't you wait for me?!" she then yelled back at the girls gathered behind her. Ayaka briefly felt tempted to just push her down the hole and be done with it.

Instead, the Class Rep simply answered properly as was her custom when not dealing with Asuna or those 3-F hussies. "Do you think it wasn't an agonizing decision for the rest of us as well, Sempai? To think we have sent Negi-sensei away, to face such tremendous foes, while we are forced to stay behind as their ace under the sleeve? But the party couldn't be that big lest we ruined what was supposed to be a surprise attack! Besides, you were rather busy elsewhere!"

"I can multi-trask!" Haruka protested vehemently. "And as much as I'm indebtowed to this school, I'm even more obligranted to my future husband! That's it! I'm going to go there, too, who's with me?!"

Rito gulped. "Well, count me in, Sempai! I already feel bad about letting Haruna-chan go like that! Just let me go fetch Itoshiki-sensei, I'm sure he'll be thrilled for a chance to throw his life away..."

Meanwhile, from the sidelines of the manor's backyard, a sudden new scream, even louder than the prior ones, briefly rattled the Ala Alba members and gathered Chaldeans out of this particular discussion over the forces of the just departed Negi.

"YOU 'DON'T OWE ME ANYTHING', YOU SAY!"

This was Yuuna's latest scream of outrage, as she stared dozens of sharp daggers coated with cobra poison at her father and the mysterious sexy woman clinging from his arm, who stood right before her in the middle of a heated debate of their own.

"That's not exactly what I mean, but yes, I don't actually owe you any explanations on why I'd want to rebuild my love life! You, on the other hand, owe your father some explanations as to why you're endangering yourself so often behind my back!" Akashi Wataru said between clenched teeth, stubbornly clinging to the last vestiges of his self control in the face of complete frustration. "Listen, there's a perfectly good and rational explanation for my choices, I just couldn't leave this noble, remarkable person to die without any chances to achieve her dreams..."

Said noble and remarkable person stuck even tighter against him as she eyed Berserker, who was staring very blunt and downright murderously at her, as if in the verge of simply rushing over to her and smashing her to a bloody pulp in a single motion. It creeped Caster to no end, and not only because of the obvious threat to her and her Master's wellbeings, but because she just hated grotesquely muscular, sweaty and aggressive macho types. Especially _this_ muscular, sweaty and aggressive macho type. They'd never really gotten along on the Argonaut.

Illya half-heartedly held her Servant back by holding onto his leg while she'd risk occasional furtive glances at the hole Haruna's drill had disappeared through shortly before Caster and the others arrived. At first she'd had no problem with just letting her brothers go into the unknown, since it technically wasn't her duty looking after them even if she was their older sister, but now she was kicking herself inwardly, realizing she couldn't just enact her long delayed revenge on them if that crazed American murdered them first. Alas, what was done already was done, and all of that. Still rather annoying oversight, though.

"W-What are you doing with _a Pactio?!_ " Yuuna's father gasped as his widdle baby now humorlessly held a shiny card for him to see. "That better resulted from a blood alliance, missy! And with sterilized tools, too!"

Yuuna lightly smacked her lips together and wiggled her tongue in his general direction, which made him squint and hiss lowly. Caster merely raised an intrigued eyebrow. She was Greek, oyakodon-type threesomes weren't too shocking for her.

The teacher bristled in anger. "God dammit, Yuuna! Look, it was never my intention to get involved in a war between, well, those versed in things you REALLY shouldn't know about, much less involve you as well, which is why I never wanted to tell you about this, but, for you to do it on your own...!"

"Blah blah, if you have a good reason to wager your life just to help this, well, ghost given a shape, then I have an even better reason! It was all to help Negi-kun and my best friends, whose lives depended on it at the time! Hell, the whole world was in the line at the time!"

"Oh, and your intervention was needed to save the world, I suppose!" her father accused.

"Yeah, it was!" Yuuna shot back. "Just go ask the Headmaster if you don't believe me, the flesh and blood from your flesh and blood, you, you ingrate!"

"The Headmaster?!" Wataru gasped. "He knew about this?!"

"It began during the trip to Kyoto," Yuuna sourly, grimly replied, not meeting her father's gaze. "It's a very long story, but the basic gist is, Konoka was kidnapped and a few of us set out to save her. It was then where I learned Negi's secrets and I had to make a Provisional Alliance with him."

"Well," Caster very quietly said, "at the very least it only was a Provisional one, Master."

"I guess so," Professor Akashi said, just as grim and sourly as before. "But, about the Headmast—"

Now Yuuna lifted her face just enough as to look at his face. "What are you expecting? An apology? I did what I had to do. Much like yourself, I guess, right?"

"I can't say I'm pleased, do you really think you can blame me?" Her father exhaled deeply. "Yuuna, why do you think you can fool me, telling me the Headmaster already knows about you and your club? Why didn't you go to tell me before? Do you think that doesn't worry me more than anything else, included what will happen to myself?"

"Um, Sensei," Ayaka intervened. "Akashi-san is right about that, actually. Headmaster Konoe indeed does know all there is to know about the English Reserach Society."

Wataru paused. "Excuse me?"

Yuuna nodded. "He already knew everything by the time we made it back from Kyoto. Was very thankful, too. Even gave us some money."

"Seriously?" Rito blinked. "He never gave me anything after I joined!"

"Why would he?" an annoyed Yuuna asked him. "He'd only be indebted to those who helped save Konoka, after all!"

"But I helped when it came to save her from that demon count, doesn't that matter?!" the orange haired boy protested.

Wataru paled further. "You... You were the ones to defeat the demon that was sealed two weeks ago?!"

"A-yep!" Misa, Madoka and Sakurako nodded as one, then grinned and high-fived. Cheerleaders still go the rhythm!

"So.. you weren't just saying it to...?" Akashi-sensei was staring into the horizon line, blankly now. "He knew... And he never told me... What, this, why this... betrayal..."

"Will you stop worrying more about whatever the Principal will think than about what your own daughter thinks when she learns you've been dating and playing magical wargames with someone named 'the Witch of Betrayal'!?" Yuuna cried.

Akashi-sensei's eyes pierced further into the distance, as he slumped down flaccidly in place. "So, wherever I look, it's all the same, everyone was keeping secrets about my flesh and blood from me..."

"Well, that might be simply karma at work," Yuuna mumbled under her breath.

Sakurako discreetly pinched her arm. "Yuuna-chan! That was accurately mean and almost uncalled for!"

Yuuna just took it like a woman while wrinkling her nose.

* * *

Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha created and own _Mahou Sensei Negima!_ and _UQ Holder_.

Nasu Kinoko and Type-Moon created and own _Fate Grand Order_ and _Fate/Stay Night_.

Batman and all related elements belong to DC Comics, a division of Time Warner Entertainment.

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice**.

 **Chapter Thirteen: It's Good to See You Again**.

* * *

"Was that a human skeleton?" Negi asked, blinking at one of the wide side windows as the large drill machine piloted by Haruna and Chachamaru quickly made its way under Mahora, diligently heading towards the roots of the World Tree. Why a drilling machine going underground would _have_ side windows is best left as an exercise in bad engineering or, more likely, Haruna being Haruna. "Because I could swear it looked like a human skeleton..."

"It's not even the first one I've seen this trip," Chisame winced, "but I guess we shouldn't be surprised after the Haunted House..."

"I don't understand this custom of yours, of simply burying corpses like that," Lala admitted while checking on Yue's signal again. "If you can't pay for a royal funeral, why not to simply cremate the remains and recycle them for the heavy industries, like our subjects do? That way, your dead will live on through your civilization's progress!"

"Please let's not think of the dead while heading over to save lives from a band of murderers, guys," an unusually serious Haruna requested, eyes fixed ahead on her machine's ever-rotating nose. "Lala-chan, are Yue's vitals still okay?"

Lala nodded. "Yeah! Thank the ancestors, too! Because if she's hurt, well, I think it's fair to warn you that I might get very, very angry and-"

"Please remember we're going to be right under a lot of innocent people!" Shirou demanded while Mordred and Artoria calmly stuffed their mouths from large bags of potato chips. "Don't even think of blowing the whole Tree up from below!"

"Certainly not!" Negi gasped. "The damage to the Leylines would be catastrophic! There's no telling what might happen!"

"Please don't say ominous things like that, it's like you're setting up the disaster already!" Chisame growled, rubbing her temples with both hands. "Have I taught you nothing?"

Mordred took a moment off from chewing and gulping. "You are a very negative person."

Artoria nodded. "My wish is erasing myself from history, and even I think you have too much of a negative outlook on things, Miss Chisame."

Negi gasped again. "Saber-san! That's your wish for the Grail, really?! Why?! That's even worse than Itoshiki-sensei's suicides, that's complete erasure of your self!"

Shirou sighed. "Don't you think I've tried talking her out of it? Why do you think I've been more interested in stopping the other Masters than winning the darn thing, even before learning it's cursed?"

Mordred sneered. "And do you think this bastard even cares I'll be gone too if he deletes himself? Typical Mr. Perfect, only thinking of what he wants!"

"I'm sorry to sacrifice your existence alongside mine, but it is an acceptable price to pay for the country's ultimate good," Artoria stoically said.

"And who do you think would gain the throne after you're ret-gone and I'm not around either, Father?" Mordred hissed. "Mother, that's who! Had you thought that far ahead, Mr. Once-And-Not-So-Future-King?"

Her father blinked, then quietly added. "Well. I'll just ask for complete removal of Uter's children from history, in that case."

"That's even worse!" her son wailed. "She may have been a cold, manipulative and poisonous bitch, but she was still my Mum! I won't let you-"

Artoria slapped her.

"Hey! What the hell, you dare-!-!"

"You won't call my sister a bitch in my presence," the other Saber icily said, "even if she indeed was a cold, manipulative and poisonous... witch."

"You were planning to erase her existence completely, tell me how that isn't much much worse! Father, you suck!" Mordred cried. She grabbed the bag of chips and proceeded to hog it all, pouting and Most-Definitely-Not-Crying-It's-Just-Liquid-Rage-Being-Pushed-Out-By-Sheer-Pressure.

Negi and Shirou, who firmly believed that it was impossible for fathers to suck, found the scene very disturbing and shuddered.

Haruna, who had a Saotome as a father, gave Mordred a sidelong glance for making a big deal out of nothing and sighed. "And I thought my family life was a headache. Okay, everyone, heads up!" she shouted as the massive roots began to make themselves visibly through the thick layers of dirt, dozens of feet ahead… somehow, in defiance of all logic and reason. "Brace yourselves, for all we know they might already know-!"

Then a massive blast of fiery lightning struck directly from the roots and through the ground, and impacted the front of the drill squarely, so strongly that it made the surface above roar and tremble...

* * *

It had taken a while to ditch the others with believable excuses, but finally, Rin and Luviagelita had found a secluded and isolated-enough spot to have their final confrontation, not that far from the World Tree itself, after kindly convincing those misguided souls having sex in the bushes to depart for other sites where their deviant acts would be more acceptable to carry over.

Which is to say, they kicked the crap out of everyone in the immediate vicinity and shooed them away, until they secured themselves a wide enough venue for their fight, despite Sakura and Miyu's pleas to leave it for that evening. They were not exactly under the Tree itself, being far enough from the tourists stationed under the venerable landmark buying overpriced souvenirs and swearing eternal love to each other, but still close enough for the purposes of this chapter's plot.

They eyed each other, smiling harshly with ferocious glints in their eyes, until Rin made the first move.

"Vigilante!" she called out.

"Destroyer!" Luvia shouted just as fast, and both of their Servants materialized at once, facing each other, eager to do battle. Vigilante's gas gun was ready and willing, as was Destroyer's roaring and humongous chainsaw. They were about to lunge at each other with matching thrilled chuckles when...

"A duck?!" Luvia called out incredulously. "You got yourself, out of all possible Servants, A DUCK?!"

The Servants, Rin, Sakura and Miyu all paused and looked incredulously at her. "Wh... Why do you sound so shocked?!" Rin finally demanded. "You summoned a duck too, didn't you?! And he's just the size as my Servant! Don't tell me now you're going to boast about his superiority!"

"She's right, Kid," Destroyer nodded at Luvia. "Boasting 'bout that is MY job!"

Luvia's right eyebrow twitched. "That... That isn't what I mean! I'll admit, somehow, we seem more or less evenly matched in this turn, Rin. I mean, I have no idea why, since I've always been your better, but maybe Heaven took pity on you at last and decided to make this a fair competition despite your usual incompetence! What I don't get is, why another duck?! Everyone knows the natural nemesis of a talking duck must be a talking mouse or talking rabbit, not another duck!"

"Bitch, what?" Rin snorted.

Luvia gestured angrily for a moment. "You know what I meant, you had the same extra lessons under Professor Zelretch! And maybe this is his fault, somehow-"

"Well, that would be a reasonable enough assumption," Tohsaka had to admit.

"- but we saw how those things tended to go, in those glimpses of those parallel worlds!" Luvia elaborated. "Duck versus duck? What are you trying to imply here, that we are not only equals in skill and power, but the same in personality type? That makes me feel ill!"

Vigilante blinked several times, then looked back at Rin. "She's even worse than you said!"

Rin grunted. "See? And you never wanted to believe me!"

"... ahhhh, to hell with it!" Destroyer lunged ahead with the chainsaw. "Enough prattle, maim and kill now, babble later, that's my-!"

But Sakura had already, from her spot at the sidelines, shouted, "Monster!" and in a blink, a new, female Servant, this one rather less silly looking unless you ask an old school Fate purist, appeared in between Vigilante and Destroyer, swiftly blocking the latter's weapon with a big honking mace.

"Oh dear," Miyu quietly said.

"What?!" Luvia cried in shock.

"The hell?!" Destroyer completed the interjection, hopping back defensively while Monster silently stood upright by Vigilante's side.

"You didn't need to bother," Vigilante mumbled to Monster. "He's an old foe of, well, MINE. I don't need any help with him, squashing him flat is what I do best."

"It. Was. Nothing," Monster gently replied to Vigilante's non-thanks without looking back at him, instead keeping the eyes behind the thick bangs trained on Destroyer.

Sakura and Rin shared a charming Tohsaka Smug Smile copied from their father (except, well, this one was actually charming, while Tokiomi's had always looked just smug) as they stood side by side, facing a bewildered Luvia. "This... This is an outrage!" the blonde yelled. "Tohsaka Rin, you cheater! This was supposed to be an one on one fair battle!"

"A-HEM!" Vigilante and Destroyer coughed.

"You're basically extensions of ourselves, her point still stands!" Rin pointed out. "Except no, Luvia, your point doesn't stand! This goes beyond a grudge match between you and me! This is the final conflict between the Tohsaka family and the Edelfelts, and it's hardly our fault if our family could bring more to the battlefield than yours, right, Sakura?"

"Right, Oneechan!" Sakura nodded firmly. "Finally old uncle Toshiro's honor will be avenged!"

"That, that's just cheating under the pretense of a flimsy excuse!" Luvia said. "How could you, Rin?! This was supposed to be our special big moment, the culmination of all that beautiful mutual hatred we built up in the Academy! And now you ruin our private climax of glory by making it a threesome with your own sister, I feel so disgusted!"

Destroyer blinked. "You're a really screwed up kid even for my standards, you know that?" he asked his Master. "Have you noticed you sound like you were just about to push this chick to the ground and-"

"Well," Vigilante sighed, "she's not that off-track when it comes to the sister thing, you know? I have seen things that you wouldn't believe, brrrr..."

"Oh, shut up, Destroyer, like you didn't spend all that time waxing on this guy and how much you wanted to axe him!" a red-faced Luvia accused her Servant. "Don't accuse us of having a relationship of that kind when it's obvious you were way much worse!"

Rin nodded sagely. "You too, huh? Mine was always ranting on how bad he had it for his archenemy, too..."

"Who do you think we are, Batman and the Joker?!" an offended Vigilante asked. "Besides, I had a girlfriend!"

"A beard, you mean," Destroyer muttered.

"I heard that!" his counterpart growled.

Destroyer rolled his eyes. "Everyone could see you had it for that huge doofus you kept around! You had a kid together, for crying out loud, who were you trying to fool? If I had a heart I'd have even felt bad for that witch chick of yours!"

"Okay, now those are fighting words...!" Vigilante bristled.

"Now, now, don't get that much of a swollen head, Destroyer," Rin said. "While he had it the most personal for you, he always made it clear you still weren't as dangerous as that bull fellow..."

"I'M NOT AS DANGEROUS AS BULLBA?!" Destroyer shouted.

Vigilante shook his head. "For all his flaws, he always had much more style than you ever did, too."

"... or the rooster fellow in the nice suit..." Rin continued.

"WHADDYA MEAN I'M NOT AS DANGEROUS AS THAT STEELBEAK PUSSY?!" Destroyer stomped down madly.

"Well, he worked for a global organization!" Vigilante argued. "You know the difference between a _global_ threat and a _local_ threat, don't you?"

"... and of course, none of you could hold a candle to Doctor Slug, either!" Rin finished.

"DOCTOR SLUG?!-?!"

"There's a good reason why he was Public Enemy Number One and you know it," Vigilante bluntly said.

Destroyer looked stung, looked aside and grouched.

"Remind me again why you never went after Doctor Slug personally, to take the top spot away from him...?" Vigilante teased mercilessly.

"Cut it out, that's in the past," Destroyer exhaled. "Anyway, I don't care! I'll fight you and that walking teapot at the same time, I'll still kill you all the same! It's a piece of-"

 _ **BONG!**_ sounded as Monster simply brought her mace down on his head.

Destroyer twitched a little under the weight of the weapon, his face hidden under the hat mashed down his head. "You're dethpicable," he lisped to Fran as his Master swallowed VERY nervously.

* * *

"Okay, remember the plan, everyone," Negi said, clenching his teeth and firmly grasping his staff. "Secure the girls ASAP, then Lala-san-"

Lala nodded as she held Warp-kun in one hand, her thumb already on the trigger. "Got it. We can always horrifically maim, torture and execute that Joker lat-"

"BURN IN HELL!" roared a sudden meteorite of flames crashing in through the front window, the already expected first strike. Negi took the deepest breath of his life, hoping to dear God he hadn't just pulled everyone to their deaths. Wrapping an arm around the waists of Chisame and Haruna while never letting go of his staff, and Matoi clung to Chisame's back, he rushed into the tunnel Quartum had just drilled through the dirt to meet them head-on, all the while Karin, Lala, Artoria and Mordred all jumped Quartum at once.

Chachamaru rushed after Negi, producing small extinguishers from her shoulders and shooting the flames left in Quartum's wake with liquid foam to extinguish them, allowing her teacher and herself a safe passage. The Averruncus growled, trying to reach back for them, but before he knew it he had Karin's mallet firmly slammed into his face, right as Lala punched him in the stomach and the Sabers cleanly sliced one of his arms off each.

"Okay," he grunted around Karin's blunt weapon. "I see I'll have to get rough on you."

And then he just spun around with a roundhouse kick wrapped in flames, swatting all four females aside. Hopping back, he sneered at them, his bleeding stumps waving in circles. "Just a flesh wound," he bitterly said. "That's all you bitches have achieved and all you ever will!"

"You remind me a lot of another loony who was just as stupidly stubborn," Artoria icily said while Shirou held onto the practice sword Setsuna had lent him before leaving, Reinforcing it to the best of his capacities, ready to join in at the slightest perceived opening. "But you should realize you're outmatched and outnumbered."

"Not when I'm just tackling a bunch of zeros!" Quartum chuckled before shooting forward feet first with surprising speed, barreling toward Shirou. Proximity with Temptress had taught him it was wise to kill the Master first when dealing with a Servant, plus he just loved seeing his opponents suffer through a fight. However, in another blink, the Saber already was before him, blocking his kick with her sword, and pushing him back violently, with visible strain.

"Saber!" Shirou cried.

"I'm fine," his Servant exhaled, eyeing the Averruncus as he rolled back, dodging Karin's next hammer slam, and headbutting the black haired immortal to bash her against a wall. The force of the impact rattled the whole vehicle, and more dirt began flowing inside of it. Lala huffed, took a handful of it, and then tossed it into Quartum's eyes, mildly surprising him long enough for her to land a haymaker blow on his chest. Quartum simply snorted and pushed her back with a foot, then shot a massive arrow of fire from his left stump, barely missing her head.

"Wow!" the pink haired alien gasped. "You can do that even without arms!"

"Arms are only appendages," Quartum smirked while waving his other stump and shooting fire at Mordred, who deflected it with Clarent, although several thick wisps still clashed mostly harmlessly against her armor. "They can be reattached and, worst case scenario, regrown with enough-"

"So the key is destroying your very core," Karin said, leaping down on him to drive the pointy shaft of her hammer into his chest. "Fine with me, monster!"

Quartum gritted his teeth as the shaft managed to pierce him, but not deep enough to reach his core. "Good try," he allowed, "but you aren't strong enough!" he explained, spinning around to hit Karin with her very own weapon, now stuck into him. "Come on, imbeciles! At least give me a warm up! I am in-"

Then Shirou, of all people, was ducking under Artoria's protective arm, grabbing the protruding end of Karin's hammer, and whispering, _"Reinforce."_

Quartum sneered, not even bothering to strike at him. "What are you trying to do, weakling? You're nothing but a- UHHHH!" he cried in pain, eyes bugging out as Shirou rapidly twisted the hammer inside of it, pushing in deeper and more strongly. Shaking desperately, Quartum kneed him in the chest and sent him flying up with such violence Shirou coughed up a thick blob of blood as Saber cried his name out. Only the Avalon planted inside of him, plus Quartum's sudden weakening, saved his life, as a normal human's chest cage would have been splattered to a mostly liquid state instead.

As Shirou landed on the floor- quickly filling with dirt and worms- with a pained grunt and Artoria rushed to his side, Quartum wheezed in agony, unable to pull the hammer out without his hands. He felt his core had been damaged, not past repair yet, but more critically than he'd have thought possible. "How is it, how could you vermin-!"

"I think this is mine!" Karin said, grabbing the hammer again and further twisting it before roughly pulling it out, Quartum screaming madly as something thick and black oozed out of him, and he fell to his knees trembling uncontrollably. "So this is an Averruncus," she coldly added, standing over him. "I remember them being more-" Then she paused. "No, how could I even remember any-"

"DIE!" Quartum shouted, springing back to his feet and violently swinging at her, managing to produce two close range, strong bursts of flame that directly shot through her, bisecting her and charring her insides to dust, even as his mouth oozed the black stuff relentlessly. He grinned cruelly to himself, satisfied, while Karin's eyes went ghastly wide.

"Kuh-Kahrin-san!" Shirou coughed while Saber held his head on her lap, Mordred merely sneering at the scene and slowly walking towards Quartum, Clarent spinning slowly as she readied a beheading blow.

Then, however, Karin only smiled. "You're a fool," she told Quartum.

"... huh...?" he blinked, standing on wobbly legs and then pulling back just in time to avoid Mordred's swing of the blade, him dropping on his butt by his severed arms.

And then, against all expectations, and surprising even her allies, Karin simply stood there, completely unhurt. The mid section of her clothes had been completely burnt away, but her flesh showed no sign of damage whatsoever. "I'm sorry to disappoint you," she told him. "But, you have absolutely no chances to ever kill me. You, on the other hand… "

* * *

The Joker looked at his wristwatch (which featured a tiny cartoon Batman with 'X' shaped dead eyes and a stuck out tongue, his arms being the watch's hands) as the alarms continued blaring all across the chamber.

"Well, that happened sooner than expected!" he cackled happily, the Heartless growing restless around his legs. He regaled Yue and Nodoka with a sharp, wide shark grin. "Looks like he cares more than I thought, gals. My congrats, maybe you have a chance after all! Granted, that's if any of you guys survives past this, and let's just say that's-"

"Joker," Temptress said, preparing herself as her ethereal keyboard materialized before her. "I know this is asking too much from you, but... get serious already."

The Clown Prince frowned, hummed as he pulled a large rusty crowbar from the back of his suit, twirling it around. "Aw geez, you're no fun, especially for a piece of jailbait. Then again, I never understood Mad Hatter's tastes..."

There were several explosions heard in the distance, each exponentially closer than the prior one, which made Yue and Nodoka gasp in concern. Even Fukawa was gulping and squirming uneasily, her hands clawing on her chair's armrests. "Is there something I should be careful about, around these friends of yours?" she asked her fellow hostages.

"Normally, if you see Sensei's about to sneeze, you should just run away as fast as you can, but that's not feasible right now, is it?" Yue replied. "Other than that... Well, those things are best learned on your own."

Temptress huffed, taking a hand to her nekomimi, activating the communication channel with... "Tsukuyomi? Have you engaged the enemy yet?"

"On my way...!" cheerfully answered the giddy voice at the other end of her line. "Oh, happy day, joyful day! I can't believe it, at last I'll see Onee-sama aga-"

When the disturbingly happy exclamation was cut short, the petite Servant frowned. "Something wrong?"

"WHERE IS SHE?!" was the next thing she heard from Tsukuyomi's voice, making Temptress flinch.

Joker raised an eyebrow. "What? Bird Girl a no-show?"

"Maybe she's just waiting in the wings to drop on her, but Tsukuyomi's an idiot and will of course leap to conclusions," Temptress muttered, not even bothering before changing the communications to... "Okay, are you two ready? The kids just dropped by, and looks like at least some of them made it past Quartum. If Tsukuyomi can't hold them back, it'll be your turn next."

"Oooooo-kay, Missy T!" Sailor Uranus' voice came over to her. "Puddin's still fine over there, ain't he? None of 'em got through the back door, ambushed you from behind, or sumthin'...?"

Joker, annoyed, gestured at Temptress to just cut the communication already, to which the Servant answered with a just an annoyed wave of a hand and brief flip of the bird. "Trust me, he's healthy and spry as ever... regretfully. No one came in through the back door to ambush his behind, and I don't think anyone would actually want to. Now, don't get too cocky just because of your powers. Ala Alba may be young and inexperienced, but they'll hardly be easy enemies. If Neptune tells you not to fool aroundand just go for the kill, do so, you hear me? Don't give them any quarters! Especially the boy! I don't care how cute he may look, he's bad news and the worst of them all!"

"Is it me," Touko asked, "or did your teacher do something very bad to her at some point?"

"He couldn't have!" Nodoka protested. "Negi-sensei's only met her once, when all of us were battling Chigusa-san, and then he didn't harm her or anything! If anything she just acted playful towards him back then..."

"Who's 'Chigusa-san'?" Touko asked now.

"Oh, nobody important, just one of those characters who show up for one arc and then are forgotten forever, so..." Joker waved a gloved hand in contempt. "Now keep your peepers well peeled, Bookworm, you might wanna write a book about what you're about to see! Assuming you live that long, naturally, but I figure, out of all of us, you might be the one with the best chances, Yours Truly excluded..."

"I'll believe that one," Yue droned. "Only the good die young, after all..."

"Precisely!" Joker nodded with a satisfied smile.

"I'll want interviews if that happens!" Touko said. At the glares the other two sent her, she glared back. "What? I want it to be accurate."

* * *

The underground chambers, or at least that section of the Mahora underground system, were not that wide and numerous. The need to keep their sole prisoner(s) isolated from anything else had forced Konoe Konoemon, ten years ago, to seal them far away from every other part of the underground complex. Hence, the current face-off between Tsukuyomi and the youngsters who had just broken into the tomb was taking place only a few– admittedly large in their own right– rooms away from where the Joker eagerly waited at the time.

"WHERE IS SHE?!" the bespectacled girl stomped a dainty foot down, quite angrily, as she kept her blade trained on Negi, Chisame, Matoi, Haruna and Chachamaru like it was a gun. To be fair, she was Shinmeiryuu, so doing so wasn't as stupid as it sounded.

"Sorry," Negi forced a smile, "but Setsuna-san was busy with more important business today. You see, she just couldn't leave her post at the Haunted House with Konoka-san alone..."

Just as he'd expected, Tsukuyomi paled and seethed, visibly outraged. "Are you telling me taking care of a dumb attraction was more important for her than seeing me again?!"

Matoi nodded. "Yes, pretty much, you've nailed it. Sorry, sucks to be you, I guess."

"NYYYYAAAAAARRRGHHH!" Tsukuyomi screamed horribly, throwing her head back as her eyes grew hideously black with red sclerae. Then, just as quickly, she madly charged forward, sword first. "That's it, die, die, die you all!"

"Great, she's even crazier than before!" Chisame said as Chachamaru dashed forward to block Tsukuyomi's strike with her crossed arm lances, sparks leaping from the violent clash. "I hadn't thought that possible!"

"Really makes you think, doesn't it?" Negi asked, pulling her and Matoi aside with himself, Haruna shadowing his moves to relative safety. "Chachamaru-san! Can you handle her?"

"I'm relatively sure I can, Sensei," the gynoid said as she kept stalling the madly hissing girl's sharp edges with her own, Tsukuyomi being too enraged to focus on anything but the target of her immediate ire right now. "I'll rejoin you as soon as I can, but for now, please go carefully."

Negi doubted, giving serious thought to the idea of simply attacking Tsukuyomi from behind (he was far more of a pragmatic than usually given credit for, whenever he wasn't fighting for sport or exercise against a friend. Also, ex-supervillain, remember?). But he quickly thought of how nimble Tsukuyomi was, meaning she was likely to avoid an attack that might hit Chachamaru instead. Besides, there was no time to waste; if the Joker already knew of their arrival, there was no telling what he could do to Nodoka and Yue. He gulped. "O-Okay, please be very careful, too..."

"Being careful won't save her or you!" Tsukuyomi promised as she kept on slashing and stabbing, coming dangerously close to actually pushing back the resilient gynoid now. "Just wait, after I'm done with this doll, I'll go after you, and then I'll send Onee-sama your-"

"Oh, go get yourself stuffed, will you?!" an upset Haruna barked without looking back at her, already drawing a massive battering ram on wheels to push ahead of them as they plowed by. Being this was a Joker hideout, there had to be plenty of traps ahead, and better to let them close on a decoy first, even though she was well aware she might take some nasty damage from it as well. She didn't care about the risks as long as she got to save Yue and Nodoka, anyway! "C'mon, Sensei, step lively!" she forcefully invited, almost pulling him along. "Remember, you've got a date with Nodoka tonight, you won't want to disappoint!"

"Ah, ah, alright!" he gulped, forcing himself to take his eyes off the intense fight and followed Saotome ahead, Chisame and Matoi in tow.

Tsukuyomi chuckled perversely as she kept on advancing towards the stoic Chachamaru, her blades already cutting on her metal surfaces as her strikes grew more methodical and observant. Despite her anger, she had gotten enough of a handle and reading on her opponent's capacities yet. "And there he goes, your dashing prince, off to save another girl while leaving you to the buzzards!" she taunted the mechanical girl. "How much of a netorare are you, Doll-han? Or is it just you're all too aware a machine like you will never have a chance with a real person?"

"Tsukuyomi-san," Chachamaru dryly said then. "Please forgive me."

Tsukuyomi blinked. "For what?"

One second later, she was very violently slammed against one of the walls carved on stone, so hard she actually left a Tsukuyomi-shaped crater on it, wincing in pain as she slid down to the the floor. "Owie...!"

Chachamaru walked slowly towards her, still holding the palm of her right hand up. "I think it only fair to warn you I have been collecting battle data from Sakurazaki-san's training since our trip to Kyoto. I consider I have a fairly accurate statistical database on how to battle a Shinmei-ryuu student now, so please spare yourself further pain and humiliation..."

"SHHUUUUUTT UP AND DIE AT ONCE!" Tsukuyomi howled, madly springing back to her feet and twirling her short swords around, once again making a deadly beeline straight for Chachamaru.

The robot made a brief stock sigh soundbyte while blocking again, really feeling that one, hard. "So different from your sister in everything but fighting style, it's unbelievable..."

* * *

 _Meanwhile, in the Haunted House:_

"- so, as you can see, my intention that night was saving a life, and I have no reason whatsoever to regret my decision," Professor Akashi finished his tale firmly, with a hand on his heart. "I did what any decent person should have done in my situation!"

"..." Yuuna fumed, red faced and clearly pouting but still unable to outright say 'you should've let her die!' before her friends.

"You should've let her die," Illya said cheerfully, and in that moment, Yuuna decided that attempts to kill them or not, the little loli wasn't so bad after all.

Ayaka sniffled, applying a tissue delicately to the tearful corners of her eyes. "How noble of you, Sensei! Throwing your life in the line of fire for the sake of a complete stranger! And then, Caster-san, repaying his services with the gratitude of a steadfast wife! Yuuna-san, although they definitely need to get properly married, I see no other objection to this beautiful relationship!"

"Miss Class Rep!" Medea said, bringing her hands together emotionally. "So you do understand our plight! I should have imagined you'd have that much insight, and yes, we really do need a wedding already!"

"Eeeeeehhhh!" Yuuna gasped. "Iinchou, why are you taking all of this at face value?!"

"Are you calling your own father a liar?" coldly asked Kiyohime, who also had grown quite attached to Medea's story. Admittedly she was a bit biased, since she had no objection to the younger Medea back in Chaldea, and merely wished she'd thought the pancake idea through.

"Not him, but, but, seriously, you're looking at this from the wrong angle!" Yuuna argued. "He's not a Magus, he shouldn't be a Master in the first place!"

Sakurako shrugged. "If it came to happen regardless, then maybe it was just fated to be, right?"

"You too, Shiina?!" Yuuna cried out.

"Accept it, Yuuna-chan, they do make a cute couple," Misa pointed out, Medea nodding with a smile and Wataru uneasily looking aside. "Why don't let your dad make his own decisions and take a stab at happiness? Seriously..."

Madoka nodded. "Yeah, I understand why you'd be wary, but he's experienced at these magical things regardless, right? He knows what he's doing..."

"No, no, didn't you listen to Tohsaka-sempai and Kuro when they were ranting on about Magi?" Yuuna insisted. "Magi are a different thing and Grail Wars should be left to them alone, even if the Grail weren't cursed! You tell them, Illya!"

The professor sighed. "I still can't believe the Grail is corrupted. Does the Headmaster know about it already? Does Father Kotomine, while we're at it?"

"Wouldn't shock me. That man's too creepy for my liking," Illya shrugged before answering to Yuuna's question. "Look, what do I care if the other Masters are Magi or not? They should be, but in this case, it makes no difference, they're all screwed before Berserker anyway..."

Heracles growled and nodded, making Medea wince and hug her Master's arm more tightly than before.

The large meeting table of the storage room remained silent for only a moment after that before Tamamo-no-Mae casually asked, "So, Sensei, if you aren't a Magus, you don't know the rituals meant to recharge a Servant's prana, right? How have you been sustaining Medea-san's presence, then?"

"Aaaaahhhhh..." Wataru 'aaaaahhhhh'-ed.

Ritsuka narrowed his eyes. "You haven't been letting her feed on souls... have you?" he coldly accused.

"For the love of God, no!" the older man protested loudly. "Nothing like that!"

Ritsuka blinked. "In that case... how?"

Illya gave Ritsuka's Servants a bewildered stare. "He doesn't know?!"

Mashu blushed and looked down. "W-Well... his sister does, but..."

"Master's the good twin," Marie Antoinette completed the thought. "We have struggled with teeth and claws to keep him that way."

"Don't speak on behalf of us all!" Tamamo huffed. "It'd have been for the best if I'd been able to educate him, but you selfish people would always interrupt...!"

"You're aware you risk losing him to Astolfo if he learns about that, aren't you?" Scathach pointed out.

Ritsuka blinked. "What are you guys going on about now?"

"They're talking about prana recharge through sex, you idiot," Illya matter-of-factly explained. "It's a crude and primitive way to supply prana, but it usually works. Or so I've heard." She proudly threw out her chest. "For obvious reasons, I don't resort to that."

Everyone looked at her, then at the huge Berseker, then down at the huge Berserker's crotch.

"Because as an Einzbern, I have a massive prana supply," Illya declared proudly.

"Sure… let's go with that," Madoka said, shuddering at the size difference.

"... oh," Ritsuka said with a very tiny voice and very big eyes, paling noticeably as Mashu and Kiyohime facepalmed, Yuuna began choking in her saliva, Ayaka and Mami simply blushed, and the cheerleaders traded mischievous looks. "I see, so that's why Nee-san always is talking about– w-wait, Mashu, that means all those times you were with my sister–!"

"N-no, Sempai, I swear I thought of you the whole time!" Mashu said.

"DDAAAAAAAADDD!" Yuuna whined over to her father. "S-S-SAY IT AIN'T SO...!"

"I think we'll go see if Misora-san needs any help at the entrance," Setsuna coughed, grabbing Konoka by a hand and pulling her along as she exited the room, despite Konoka's obvious interest to stay over and keeping on listening…

* * *

They stood side by side, like good sisters in arms. Well, saying 'sisters' is likely stretching it a lot. Or then again, considering what sisters did in Mahora, maybe not. They still had a strong warrior bond all the same, though, but it's probably better comparing it to those of Spartan soldiers. Not because either of them were too obsessed with fighting itself (for both of them, fighting was the means to an end, and in some cases, foreplay) but because, well, they had come to solidify their relationship in the hard world of urban combat with the kind of personal relationship Spartans would often favor. At least as long as Joker was far enough from Harley, that is.

The two Sailor Senshi stood at the next large chamber of the underground tombs, eyes fixed on the wide, closed stone doors before them.

"Wanna bet they don't even make it here?" Sailor Uranus cracked a smile.

Sailor Neptune shrugged. "On the one hand, I'll never trust any traps set by your boss, but on the other, they're still just children. Who knows?"

"I'm tellin' you, they must be Swiss cheese by now, Red," Uranus insisted. "Kind of a pity, though, the kid was kind of cute, maybe Puddin' and I have coulda adopted him! Given him a makeover, called him Joker Junior…"

Before Ivy could answer to this flimsy musing properly, the stone door was rattled with a loud boom and collapsed into rubble from the other side, and in stomped a rather furious Negi Springfield, his shorts and the open jacket he'd thrown on himself before coming over quite heavily damaged and torn in places. Next to him, Haruna was supported on his smaller frame, wincing and groaning as she put a hand to her ribs, containing her pain. The massive battering ram she'd just created to bring the door down had drained a lot of her energy, already compromised after her other creations had taken so much damage while sorting out the traps in their path.

Harley bit on her lower lip. "Then again, tell ya what, maybe I wouldn't be the best mom for this kinda kid."

Ivy stared coldly at her for a second.

Harley shrugged. "Whaaaaat?! Can ya blame a red-blooded gal? It's easy for you, your heart only pumps plant juice, but you know this boy's supposed to be-"

"Out of our way!" Negi growled, pointing at them with his long, hard, rigid, threatening wooden staff, perhaps further cementing Harley's point. "My students have already suffered enough because of you!"

"Weeeeell, good afternoon to you too, Mr. English Gentleman!" Uranus snorted. "What, upset 'cause the nerd you brought in got a few boo-boos? Sorry, I mean one of the nerds, anyway," she corrected herself, as she saw Chisame stopping shortly behind Negi, Matoi closely in tow. "Guess what, in any case? You ain't getting past us no matter what, so maybe it's you who whould get outta the way! Shoo, shoo, why don't you go back home and drink some more milk before coming here to pester actual, grown up, empowered Magical Girls, huh?"

"Old Magical Hags, you mean," Matoi said under her breath.

"That's rich, comin' from a boy in a girl's kimono!" Harley snapped.

"What?! I'm a perfect Japanese bride, and this isn't a kimono, it's a light summer Japanese-"

"Enough," a disgusted Neptune said, gesturing with her hands and causing two massive vines to break through the floor, snaking menacingly around her. "Uranus' right, you know, children. We were already too dangerous for you before gaining new powers, and even if you have magic of your own, what makes you think it'll compare at all to ours?"

Negi huffed, pulling a card out of a pocket in his jacket. "There's only one kind of magic that really matters. That which comes from the heart, something you obviously don't have. The rest? The rest can be canceled!" he shouted, waving the card and bringing Asuna to his side, her harisen already prepared, and smirking in readiness.

"Oboy, another punk kid with a silly toy," Harley, a woman who regularly used weaponized pogo sticks, boxing gloves and rubber chickens, rolled her eyes. "Guess it's time to give up, then!"

Ivy hissed, the large vines already slowly forming a loose defensive shield around her while leaving enough openings for her to strike through. "Harley, don't be an idiot. Don't you remember her from Kyoto? Didn't you see what she could do?"

"Oh, give me a break, Red, that was how many chapters ago? I barely can tell this one apart from the second nerd with glasses!"

Chisame sighed. "Why do people think we look alike so often?" she asked Asuna. "Seriously, we aren't alike at all!"

Asuna didn't look back at her, studying her opponents before her like Setsuna had taught her to, as opposed to just charging in and beating them over the head like her Onii-sama had taught her. She figured she'd give Setsuna's way a shot before she went for the clearly superior method. She'd been ready for a while now, as before leaving Negi had made clear she'd be one of his ace in the hole and she should be prepared at any given time. Something she was glad to do for Honya and Ayase. "I know, right? But don't worry, despite everything, I'm not offended!"

"That's my line," Chisame mumbled. "So, um, be careful anyway, will you?"

"Of course. Thank you," Negi nodded as he handed Haruna over to her, Matoi slapping Saotome's hand aside just a bit as the mangaka took advantage of the shift to wrap her arm around Chisame's torso in a way that was just a tad too intimate with Hasegawa's bustline. He breathed deeply as he and Asuna fell in a standing position side by side, as coordinated as they could act given their circumstances. "Ready, Asuna-san? I know we haven't had the chance to train together as well as Erebus-san and Twilight Red-san have, but-"

"It's never too late to start, I guess," Asuna forced a groan, each of the duos seizing the other, and neither fully willing to strike first yet. "Okay. You take the plant lady, I'm left with the bimbo, right?"

Negi nodded. "Fine with me."

"Bimbo?! Are you talking me?!" Uranus shrieked. "Missy, I know you hang out with that pink haired spore from Kyoto! You've got a whole lotta nerve, callin' me a bimbo while breathin' the same air as-"

"You leave Maki-chan out of this, bitch!" Asuna roared, charging ahead with her Artifact swinging, and the battle started over in earnest...

* * *

Meanwhile, somewhere else in the actual Festival, one Morisato Megumi finished writing down on the dotted line of an entrance form with a kittenish smirk, then handed the document she'd just signed to the young woman tending the booth she and her current companions were at.

"So, when do we get to see our vehicles?" she eagerly asked the pineapple-haired redhead who had just offered her this chance.

"Well," the younger girl said, "I'll give you this booklet with info on the race, which you'll have to take to the water track by Library Island early tomorrow, the map on how to get there is right here on the back cover. There's no way to miss-"

"Oh, 'scuse me a sec, please," Megumi said, looking aside and then waving, the rest of her group looking in the same direction as she happily greeted a short young man walking up to greet them. "Keiichi! Over here, over here! Boy, it sure took you long enough to find us!"

Morisato Keiichi sighed as he finally met his younger sister face to face again, closely followed by Natsumi, Mikan and Skuld. Behind Megumi, Tamiya, Ootaki, Chihiro and the pirate Servants were also coming closer, Natsumi flinching slightly at the vision of the huge, muscular Tamiya, and again at the huge and… muscular… Anne. Big men making sudden appearances never failed to startle her and make her feel uncomfortable, which was why she discreetly stepped behind Skuld as best as possible. With Anne, she flinched for a different reason. "Yo, Megumi, everyone," the older Morisato sibling weakly saluted, really wishing this was happening, at the very least, in a marginally less packed and problematic day. "Sorry 'bout that, we've been having some… technical difficulties. "

"KEIICHI!" Tamiya bellowed as theatrically as ever, rushing past Megumi to crush the much smaller young man in a violent bear hug against himself, making Keiichi squeal in pain. "Been so long, pal! Yuh barely call, what's with that? Yuh know th' old club ain't been the same with'ut yuh anymore!"

"Yeah," Chihiro snickered, "without you now they actually have to clean the place up themselves. Or else," she smirked, briefly crackling her knuckles together in a way that intimidated not only Tamiya and Ootaki, but also Natsumi as well. "By the way, Morisato-kun, why are you suddenly surrounded by... well, you know...?"

"It's, it's not what you think, Sempai!" Keiichi protested to his old Motor Club superior, while Megumi, Tamiya and Ootaki all threw fairly dirt glares his way, and Natsumi winced once again. Skuld made a visible face of disgust, although Mikan looked fairly unfazed by it all. "They'e just some kouhai I've been helping around while here...!"

"Yeah, I can vouch for that, I'm a classmate to Sku-chan there," intervened the girl sitting behind the booth, taking pity on the Sempai. "How do you do, guys? Been having fun so far?"

Keiichi blinked, realizing the redhead's presence at last. "Ah! It's you... Asakura-san, right? What are you doing here?"

"Whaddya mean you don't know?" Tamiya asked him. "Yuh gonna tell us yuh hadn't registered f'r this race yet?"

"Tora-kun," Ootaki said, "I think Morisato doesn't know how to swim yet, right? And this' a race on water..."

"Yuh haven't learned yet?!" Tamiya shouted, grabbing Keiichi by the shoulders and rattling him. "Man, what've yuh been doin' here den?! Okay, we didn't have dat many places tah swim at Nekomi, even our public pools were just dingy pissholes, but how comes yuh come here, dis place of fancy big-name education, and yuh don't even bother to take swimmin' lessons, man?!"

"I've had too many other things to dooooooo!" Keiichi complained as he was shaken back and forth like the proverbial ragdoll.

"That ain't no excuse, lazy-ass! 'Sides, even if yuh can't swim yet, so what?! It's awright as soon as yuh don't fall off da waterbike! Skippin' over a race?! I don't know ya anymore, y'have dishonored da club...!"

Chihiro pinched his arm, her small fingers somehow leaving a red mark through the thick layers of muscle and forcing Tamiya to drop Keiichi with a pained whimper. "Now, now, Tamiya-kun, there'll be time to punish Morisato-kun's loss of racing spirit later! But first, don't you all think we should introduce ourselves to Morisato-kun's new, pretty, underage surely platonic good friends? How do you do, girls?" she smiled angelically, which was Mikan's first real sign of danger around her. It was the same smile Mikan's mother made whenever she wanted something from you. "My name's Fujimi Chihiro, president of the Nekomi Motor Club! This is Morisato Megumi, Morisato-kun's little sister, but he's surely told you about her, right?"

"Well, actually..." Mikan, Kazumi and Natsumi all began at the same time, but Keiichi hastily interrupted them before Megumi could be offended beyond a sharp raise of eyebrows.

"And these are two of my and Sora's other sempai there, Tamiya Toraichi and Ootaki Hikozaemon! Great guys both, taught me all I know, they really did, please don't hurt me boys! Um... I don't know who are you two, however..." he carefully eyed the two girls in pirate cosplay. "Would you be new recruits for the club? I'm glad to meet you all the same, but..."

"They just picked us up on the road here, that's all," dryly explained the shorter of the two girls, who suddenly made Skuld's eyes widen as soon as she spoke. "I'm Mary, and this is Anne." At this, the much taller and bustier blonde waved her hello in a quite festive way, hand of mostly drunk liquor well held in her other hand. "We're just looking for some... friends... we lost in our way here, nothing more."

"By the way, I take it that style is popular around here?" Anne giggled, pointing at Mikan's head and then at Asakura's. "I kind of like it, I was thinking of maybe getting one after getting back home...!"

"Don't you dare," Mary muttered darkly under her breath.

"Aw, but Mary...!" her partner pouted.

"No. Just no."

Natsumi, Mikan, Tamiya and Ootaki all briefly traded half-confused glares with each other after this. Kazumi, Megumi and Chihiro only smiled, however, Skuld facepalmed, and Keiichi simply sighed, too used to that kind of stuff from his time with Ala Alba as to care anymore. How depressing, too, once he'd have considered those not that subtle hints very hot in a way, but now, nothing short of seeing Hakase-san and Shiina-san kissing moved him that way anymore...

* * *

 _Meanwhile, three days after:_

"Nice place!" Astolfo praised as he sat down at the small, crowded table, somehow managing to get a seat in before the more forceful Servants present could. Not that most of them even needed it at all, what with having spiritual forms and all, but the Chaldea method of fighting had made them less willing to go that route, most often favored by Servants in 'normal' Grail Wars across the multiverse.

As he said that, the pink haired little thing of sexually ambiguous charm smiled, looking appreciatively across the wrecked room.

The even smaller- though not by that much- hooded figure of mystery who had guided them there after meeting them in the wreckage sighed, currently sitting at the head of the table. "This," she said, for her voice was clearly feminine, even though that wasn't definite proof of anything just yet, as Astolfo himself could attest, "is the former place of residence of Negi Springfield, magical boy prodigy, greatest heroic legend of my time. Three days ago, he welcomed your friends after their arrival to this world. By that very afternoon, they had unwittingly destroyed this world."

Ritsuko, who had taken another of the chairs and rested on it with the pimpastic attitude and posture of a gangsta queen, nodded pensively. "Of course, I see. That sounds like something Oniichan, Blackbeard, Kiyohime and the rest would do, alright. Told you we should've been the landing party, Sensei!" she told Leonardo, who sat by her left, Astolfo being by her right. Nero and Medb had also gotten themselves chairs, while the Urd and the rest of the Servants just waited behind them, standing in attention. All but Vlad, who had wandered over to another room in the back while nobody was paying him any attention.

"Fuuu kyuuu!" opined the white fluffy animal sitting on Ritsuko's scalp.

"W-Well, and you're trying to say Master Ritsuka's dead, then?!" Nitocris nervously asked. "I refuse to believe that, they are far too strong to have fallen so easily! Besides, I placed the blessing of Lord Medjed on them before they left!"

Hoodie-chan stared blankly at her. "... believe what you wish, but if they were still around, don't you think you'd have found them already? The demon pillar residing inside of Nagi Springfield, the Thousand Master, already incinerated this world, and soon his actions will reverberate through history. Destroying not only this present, but also the past and the future..."

"I thought you had said that Nagi guy was the greatest hero of your time?" Astolfo blinked cluelessly.

Hoodie clenched her teeth within the folds of her cloak. "No! That was Negi, his son! This is a related, but completely different fellow!"

Astolfo pouted and fumed. "Well, you should've made that clear before! Just before you made it clear Master was- WAIT A SECOND, MASTER IS DEAD, NO, THAT CAN'T BE!"

Ishtar looked at Nobunaga. "A retarded reaction sort of boy, isn't he?"

The Demon King shrugged with a smirk. "A retarded sort of boy is more like it, I think."

Medb sighed. "How depressing. Worst part being, I'm sure he died a virgin, too! I knew I shoud've taken care of him myself, no matter the protests of that idiot fox and the snake..."

Urd stomped over, angrily, and then slammed a hand on the table before Hoodie. "I call you on your bullshit!-!"

Hoodie exhaled. "Okay, and why would that be?"

"You... You can't just tell me my sister, my only remaining sister, went down like that too, just because!" Urd heatedly replied, tears fighting to come out at the corners of her green eyes. "Even though she was a dumb, bratty twerp, s-she was smarter than that, and she had a plan to save this world, and... and...!"

Then she unceremoniously pushed Astolfo aside, plopped down on his chair, and covered her face with her hands. "Oh Father, give me strength! Not this, not after Belldandy, why...!"

"Oh, relax, it's not like it can't be averted, as long as I send you back in time to stop the catastrophe from ever taking place at all," Hoodie chided her. "That's no reason to be rude to poor Pink Trap-san."

"Of course not, uguuuu!" Astolfo agreed from the floor while rubbing his bum.

"Well, while your absurd statements about changing the past come off as ridiculous even for someone who's spent months traveling across worlds gathering a harem of dead heroes, I still choose to believe you," Ritsuko said, taking the news of her brother's violent demise remarkably well. "I mean, I have to! After all, without Oniichan I'd have to work twice as hard to fill his quota! And I have Love Live and Idolmaster games to catch up on!"

"There's also that Magi Mari game the Doctor insists on you to try already, remember," Saber Alter coolly reminded her.

Urd took a look between her fingers, her reddened eyes staring almost viciously at the hooded figure. "Who are you, anyway, and why would you know so much about Negi and Skuld? How do we know you aren't with the enemy?"

"It's no shock you wouldn't recognize me, since as I understand your domain is the past," Hoodie said. "I come from further ahead in human history, a place and time that won't exist anymore if the demon pillar's triumph becomes absolute. It's not even my first time traveling to this era. You could say I've always specialized in jumping back through time, and once I even made it to these times, but... well, that was one of the timelines deleted and replaced when your sister's accomplice altered the timestream once again."

Urd lowered her hands fully, eyeing Hoodie with dawning horror. "Don't tell me you're..."

"For a short time, I held the star seed of Mars, but that is in the past now... or rather, it never came to pass," Hoodie 'explained', although to the Chaldea contingent it only made everything even more muddled. Astolfo had just called his quits on trying to understand any of this and wandered over to pick a few magazines to read. Much to his annoyance, he only could find ones on advanced science, since Chamo's porn stash was very well hidden. "I am an immortal, and recently my time period was rattled. One of my friends had her consciousness apparently whisked away to this time, into her body from this time period, and other such anomalies could follow. So I had to take the chance and use our leader, Savage-sama's, time machine to travel back to this time and gather info on this disaster..."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Urd facepalmed. "You're that little blonde bitch, aren't you? I've heard of you, you're one of those bugs in that accursed future that never should come to pass... Cutlass, right?"

Hoodie made a tense, long silence of muted outrage, after which she exploded at Urd, pulling back on her hood and revealing a cute yelling face, framed by honey-blonde thick braids, and featuring solid glasses as well. "What the hell, I'd never been so insulted in my whole life! Any of them! If you're going to remember legends from my time period, remember the correct ones, damn it! I'm Sakurame Kirie! From the immortal Organization! I was there in that loop where your sister went over to the parallel multiverse to fight Darkness, remember?!"

"Okay, now I think I'm rooting for this world's destruction, too," Ritsuko said, blinking. "What the fuck are you guys on, I can't understand a single thing! What, do I need to read five previous stories before getting what you're babbling about here? By the way, where's Uncle Vlad? Normally he gets upset and lays the law down whenever someone's talking convoluted shit like that for no good reason at all!"

* * *

Meanwhile, very near them, in Chisame's bedroom to be precise, the fearsome Impaler of Wallachia had found Chiu's closet and was examining it with eyes full of admiration.

"The work of a true genius of sewing...!" he marvelled, overcame by emotion. "Truly, this world has lost such a great artist...!"

* * *

 _Back under the Tree, Three Days Back:_

The Joker caressed the bracelet around his pale right wrist for a moment, contemplating whether to activate it or not, before shaking his head to himself and pulling his sleeve back up.

"I'd rather fight like myself," he chuckled with a crooked grin, tugging on the lapels of his suit, "and I'm sure it'll change me if I need it anyway! So, you girls ready? Keep those peepers well peeled, because this is going to be quite the show!"

"Already losing your trust your girlfriend will stop Negi-sensei, I assume?" Yue asked, as coolly as she could manage, with the experience of years mastering her emotions.

"You know how it is, hope for the best, always be ready for the second worst, always BE the worst!" Joker spun the crowbar once again, the Heartless creatures growing even more restless around his feet. "Patience, my pretties, patience! Your time's almost up, but you can't jampack so many plotlines all at once, not even here!"

The sound of a very loud explosion from a few rooms away distracted him and Temptress, while the three hostages gasped and the Heartless jumped up and down giddily, like mischievous children eager to wreck havoc. "Well, would you just listen to that?" Joker commented. "Well behaved kids always hide the most pent up aggression, you know. They're the ones who grow up into serial killers and the like, little punks settle down with the right woman or, at the best, become gangbangers if they grew up in a ghetto..."

"That was racist," Temptress noted.

"I'm the whitest of all white men, sue me! If it's any consolation, I've always been an equal oportunity employer, I'll take blacks and even Japs like you happily! I'm not a Nazi freak like Red Skull!"

Suddenly, Nodoka squinted and craned her neck ahead, giving the Heartless a silent, long hard glare which was promptly noticed by Fukawa. _"What's up?"_ the author whispered to her. _"Found any way out?"_

Nodoka shook her head. _"No,"_ she whispered back, _"but for a moment... these imps seemed to remind me of something, I don't know..."_

"They're sort of like those Orphans Haruna mentioned, right?" Yue joined the conversation in hushed tones while Temptress and Joker debated among themselves. "Then again, it makes sense you'd be more sensitive to them, you have a connection to magic I lack..."

Nodoka pulled her head back and concentrated. "I almost seem to remember, I mean, it's almost like I'm having _deja vu_. I feel like I should know from where do they come, but..."

"Don't strain yourself too much, your head might explode any time now," Touko snarked. "Seriously, what good does it do, knowing from where they came if we can't escape them anyway?"

"Patience, I said!" Joker called back over his shoulder while gesturing at Temptress to shut up for a moment. "Sheesh, thanks for the foreshadowing, I'm sure that'll be helpful later, but enough already, we'll get into that soon enough! If I don't kill you first, that is!"

"Last time I work with a clown," Temptress muttered.

Joker nodded. "An accurate prediction, too, I'd say..."

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

Blackbeard took a good, long, lingering look at all the girls gathered around them, then placed his large hands on his Master's shoulders and smiled beatifically at him.

"I'm so proud of you," the Rider fondly said.

"... you're misinterpreting things," Ritsuka said.

Blackbeard pulled back and let out a grandiose, heavy, overly dramatic sigh that would have made Shakespeare proud. "My Master, truly a man among men! Sailing through unknown waters after heeding my advice back at Chaldea, you have now gathered a fine harem to make this poor old man's heart happy...!"

"We wouldn't have such awful tast- I mean, we wouldn't dream of getting in the way of Kiyohime-san, Tamamo-san and Mashu-san," Ayaka said with a grimace of deep disgust.

"Certainly not, we have self-preservation," Misa agreed.

Blackbeard was still not listening. "Now your sister won't be ashamed of you anymore, Master! Damn it, you've pulled even more of them than what she gets on a good expedition! You've become such an inspiration to me, I see I'll have to pick up my game too now..."

"Rider!" Ritsuka complained. "They're just some new friends we've made here, and most of them already love someone else! I didn't summon you here for that, we were supposed to look for the Demon Pillar, remember?!"

"And I've been looking for it too, Master!" the shifty looking man said, very seriously holding up his large bags overstuffed with all sorts of doujin, rolled up posters, figurines, and hentai artbooks. "See, I've looked hard and carefully through every den of vice and corruption in this school, and I found evidence something definitely very evil's afoot here!"

"Oh!" Marie Antoinette eagerly said. "You brought some Yaoi, too?"

Mashu blinked. "Wait, Your Majesty, say what?"

Teach blinked as well at the question from the much smaller fellow Rider, swallowed hard at the sight of her lovely thrilled expression, and then had to reluctantly admit, "N-No, but I could... tell you where to buy it, certainly..."

"Oh, you can, now?" Scathach smiled.

"It's true what they say about sailors," Medea said, nodding.

"Ehhhh!" the pirate groaned. "Don't get the wrong idea, Ma'am! I was offered a lot of that stuff by lovely vendors with sharp tongues, but I won't be tricked by feminine wiles so easily! Concerning women, I'm nothing but a conqueror, just like Master!" he boasted, patting Ritsuka's back hard enough to make him whine in pain.

"You have too few stars to be a conqueror, that's Iskander and Alexander's thing," Ritsuka said.

Kiyohime sighed in frustration. "Are you telling me that, after I was summoned away, you didn't keep investigating those stashes of automatons we found underground? I didn't believe I could be any more disappointed on you, but you've found a way!"

"Ah, yes, those robots you mentioned earlier," Satomi rubbed her chin pensively. "The more I think about it, the more I grow convinced they're related to what Negi-sensei mentioned about Chao. Nobody else in the campus would have the savvy and resources for something like that..."

"You sound very chill about your best friend turning out to be someone who wants to reveal magic to the whole world and stashes whole armies of stripping Terminators underground," Madoka pointed out.

Satomi blinked, confused. "Why would I be shocked about any of that? That's right the kind of person Chao has always been!"

"Figures..." Misa snorted.

"Of course," Satomi elaborated, "I am upset at her over not telling me about those plans, but I understand how she might think my loyalties might be... compromised after my recent liaison with Negi-sensei. That doesn't mean I won't demand for a satisfying explanation on the subject from her, naturally, but I will try my best to do it rationally, like civilized people; a serious dispute between us might be rather harmful to Chachamaru's emotional development, after all..."

Sakurako looked less than pleased at the reminder of her girlfriend's sort-of domestic partner.

Watching over this exchange, Blackbeard squeezed on Ritsuka's shoulder. "You've gotten yourself some pretty but very strange girlfriends, Master."

"For the last time, they aren't my girlfriends!" Ritsuka protested.

"I am engaged to another man!" Haruka argued.

"I am engaged to THIS man!" Medea said, hugging Wataru's arm.

"I'm not seeing any engagement rings on those hands!" Yuuna pointed out.

"We're lesbians!" Sakurako informed, pulling Satomi towards herself. "And so are Konoka and Setsuna, but don't let Setsuna ever hear it," she added, lowering her voice confidentially while a few rooms away, Setsuna could be heard sneezing loudly.

"Haruna-chan's my girlfriend!" Rito firmly said.

"Sempai, Haruna's not here and this guy hasn't even met her yet," Misa said.

"I know, but I'm being proactive, see? She can't help being that pretty, this wolf's sure to leap on her as soon as he sees her!"

"Or vice-versa," Kiyohime mumbled darkly before telling Blackbeard, "Besides you rude pirate, in your blessed absence I have solidified my Bond Points with Anchin-sama!" And she proudly held up her shiny new Pactio card.

"Exclusive my fluffy tails, he kissed me as well!" Tamamo said, brandishing her own card while Ritsuka winced and edged slowly behind the shocked Blackbeard.

"I'd like to remind you I did it before either of you could..." Marie declared, showing her card as well.

Scathach, in a single elegant move, forced Mashu to hold her own card up, too. "H-Hey!" the Shielder gasped helplessly.

"Don't ever be discouraged from speaking your mind," the Lancer instructed her. "You are a strong woman, fight for your own rights as such! Be brave, lass! I am behind you every step of this path!"

"Yes, until you find your opening to bed Master yourself, instead!" Tamamo bared her teeth at the undying witch.

"I would not! Unless I am invited to join them in partaking from such pleasures, that is," Lancer alleged. "Besides, there's always his sister."

Mashu's face was now so red it looked almost purple. "Wha-What-What are you talking about, why would I, why would we, I mean, please say something, Sempai...!"

With a very still expression, Blackbeard tightened an arm around his Master and held him firmly against his side, almost crushing him in an absent, faraway manner. "Please teach me your secrets. I will happily become your unquestioning lieutenant until the end of time itself!"

"LOOK, LET'S JUST GO OUT LOOKING FOR THAT PILLAR ALREADY, OKAY?!" Ritsuka cried out desperately.

"Is that what we look like from the outside?" Misa said. "No wonder people think we're weird."

* * *

 _Meanwhile, Underneath The World Tree:_

They clashed again and again, potent sparks constantly leaping from the hits of metal on metal, both combatants moving quickly across the relatively small and narrow room. Tsukuyomi acted far more aggressively, sneeting and hissing as she struck from every angle, while Chachamaru mostly acted defensively but never leaving an opening, her motions more careful and studied.

Tsukuyomi knew the long term strategy the robot was using played against her. Moving so fast and angrily, she was burning herself out, her intense activity playing against her much higher than usual endurance and stamina. On the other hand, the doll likely did not grow exhausted and had machine-like reserves of energy to outlast hers, but Tsukuyomi was so furious all of this knowledge was mostly ignored in the burning haze of her battle rage.

"Sending someone, no, _something_ , like you, instead of coming herself-!"

"It's for your own good, as well," Chachamaru calmly said, blocking another dual sword strike and pushing back, just hard enough to stall rather than seriously hurt. "Setsuna-san doesn't want to fall into a mutually destructive spiral with you. She thinks it'd be for both your best if you stay apart. It's not her, it's you..."

"Who gave her the right to decide that for me?!" her opponent cried, technically cheating and also lashing out with an upwards arc kick, under which Chachamaru managed to duck. "And why are you bothering to lie, it's obvious Ojou-chan decided that for her! She stole Oneesama's willpower, her ability to think for herself, away from her!"

"It may be true Setsuna-san submits her will to Konoka-san's more often than she should," Chachamaru allowed, doing a leg sweep that briefly threw Tsukuyomi off balance, allowing the gynoid more time to expand on her point, "but that's something Konoka-san herself tries to remedy. I'm sure you and she could be brought together, eventually, but for that you'd have to change, all love demands sacrifices. And I think Setsuna-san finds your siscon tendencies disturbing..."

"Dolls don't get to lecture me on love!" Tsukuyomi seethed, madly cutting ahead and finally managing to it Chachamaru on a leg, damaging some artificial knee tissue. "You don't know what you're talking about! I bet someone simply recorded all of that nonsense into you!"

"I'm serious," Chachamaru insisted, jet feet flaring up enough as to send her flying above Tsukuyomi's head, forcing her to direct her strikes upwards now, something she was less familiar with. "Don't believe me if you wish, but that won't change anything. Despite being a warrior, Setsuna-san's heart longs for peace, and you only insist on bringing strife..."

"Oh, I can bring her everlasting peace if she's so adamant!" the girl with glasses sneered, just before a round kick from Chachamaru, swinging downwards, punted said glasses off her face, sending them crashing against a wall. "Uhh! Do you think that'll stop me?! Even blinded, I'm used to rely on my other senses...!"

"I know," Chachamaru said, as from her antennae, a loud beeping sound filled the room, making Tsukuyomi wince and flinch at the auditory discomfort. Easily navigating around the disoriented Shinmeiryuu while sending calculated kicks to key points, the gynoid softly continued, voice steady over the shrill noise, "You are smart, but you are so set in your ways, so stubborn, you won't accept they only make the person you claim to love unhappy. If your concept of happiness is so different from hers, you should look for happiness elsewhere..."

Tsukuyomi focused, stabbing up on the sole of a foot, damaging the jet enough to force Chachamaru to crash back down, the still shaky squinting and smaller girl on top of her immediately. "I'll look for my happiness wherever I want to, thank you so much!" she yelled, lifting her main blade over her head. "Now be quiet just a second, this won't hurt-!"

"No. It won't," Karakuri promised back, as calmed as ever, as her right flew literally flew up and rocked Tsukuyomi squarely on the chin, knocking her back and out with a whiny groan. Chachamaru easily caught her before her unconscious body would hit the floor, holding her against herself. "I'm sorry. In a way, you remind me of my master," she said while turning her volume down and finally off. "But I meant all of what I said. Maybe, someday, you'll understand..."

Chachamaru was, after all, a dreamer. Of the electric sheep variety.

* * *

 **Interlude: But What Of Us?**

"..." Sayo said, sitting on the table in her doll body.

"..." Oshizu said, also sitting on the same table, in her own doll body.

Then, as one, they turned their large round heads to look at Kiri, who elegantly sat at the same table set at the middle of classroom 3-F, sipping quietly from her cup of steaming green tea.

After she was done drinking, she set the cup down and repeated herself, "For the last time, no. Much less now of all days! There are more people... _outside_ -" she shuddered at the mere effort of uttering the word, "- today than any other day of the year!"

"But, but I'm the only student of my class who hasn't gotten any screentime yet since this saga started!" Sayo complained, and that was completely untrue by the way since Ku Fei hasn't shown up yet either. Or Mana, for that matter. Crap. "People might start mistaking me for some zombie apocalypse meanie!"

Kiri smiled benevolently. "But we can have our own Festival indoors, and it'll be way more entertaining and safer!"

"How so?" Oshizu asked.

"We can have origami contests!" Kiri eagerly proposed. "Prank call competitions!" she added, holding up her cellphone, which then beeped with more insulting junk messages from Meru. "We can play rock, paper and scissors! Our own chess tournament! I could call Mom and tell me to bring me enough clothes so we can have our own cosplay pageant! Or we can look out the window and play 'Find Waldo' with the crowds, that's always fun..."

The dolls looked at each other again.

"You know," Oshizu finally said, "I think I'll just go look for Mikado-sensei, want to come with me?"

"No, thanks," Sayo replied, "the other day, Asakura-san told Iinchou-san she'd be working at a booth, I might as well go and see what's she doing..."

"Why her, though?" Oshizu asked.

Sayo shrugged. "She's the least likely to be on a date today, so I shouldn't be interrupting anything personal? What's _your_ reason for choosing Mikado-sensei beyond canon, anyway?"

Kiri pouted. "Okay, if we're playing it that way, I think I'll just call Chie-sensei and tell her to come here for some ambiguous yuri teasing, do you think I'm any more pleased about being sidelined than you girls are?"

* * *

 _Back underground:_

"I'll have you know I'm a qualified psychiatrist," Sailor Uranus happily boasted as she blocked Negi's first punch with her giant mallet, "so I'll give you a free psychological evaluation as we fight! Aren't you a lucky little guy?"

"Please, just get out of my way!" Negi growled, punching the mallet again and breaking it to pieces.

Uranus pouted as she threw the useless weapon away. "I should charge you just for that, but I'm used to violent cases, so whateva." She pirouetted back from Negi's next strike attack (he was reluctant to use magic just yet, preferring to save it for later instead, and so was resorting to martial arts now) and stuck her tongue out at him. "Okay, the first thing I can see is a serious inability to cope with frustration..."

Negi seemed to blink out of sight for a moment, startling her, and then reappearing at her side, elbowing her in the ribs and tossing her against a wall. She winced in pain, and he fumed, seeing her Sailor Senshi powers had rendered her strong enough as to withstand the attack without dropping unconscious as he'd dared hoping for a moment. It never was that easy, was it?

Harley clenched her teeth, dislodging herself from her nice Harley-shaped hole in the wall. "Want to switch opponents?" Neptune offered while commanding more tentacled vines down on Asuna, who just kept on cutting through them with her sword.

Harley shook her head. "Nope. Gonna stick to this case now I'm on it, thanks! Now I think I detect a strong inner dychotomy in you. You fancy yourself a gentleman, yet you're a violent troublemaker eagerly latching onto any excuse to cut loose. Really, kid, pay attention, you're one chemical accident away from an Arkham room..."

"Too late," Asuna called over her shoulder. "He's already been a supervillain."

Harley blinked. "What, really?"

"Youngest supervillain in the history of Great Britain," Negi confirmed. "I'm not proud of it." Well, maybe a little proud of it.

"I call bullshit! I've bet British villain guys, what you do isn't being a supervillain! They hang out in the same bars as heroes, that's just wrong!"

Negi, not bothering to answer, whispered an incantation that wouldn't hurt the witnessing Chisame, Chamo, Matoi and Haruna even if it was repelled in such narrow spaces. Using his wind element, he wrapped Uranus in a tight, squeezing chain of vaguely-yellow magic strands of air, which made her squeal. "See?! Those are sadistic tendencies! Deep inside, you like to see cute girls restrained, don't you?!"

Negi smiled, tightening the snaring spell and deciding to take a page of Kotaro's book if it could throw her further off balance and end things at once. "I'm not restraining any cute girls here, Auntie."

"Auntie?!" Uranus yelled, exerting her arms and pushing free from the snare, surprising Negi. Apparently, this particular Sailor Senshi was stronger than Venus, Mars and Mercury, and the same was true of Neptune seeing from how Asuna hadn't put her down yet. "Oh, why you little...! Obviously, you haven't ever had any proper parental figures to guide you!"

"I had the best!" Negi growled, angrily taking the offensive again, surprising Uranus with a barrage of rapid-fire punches to her midsection, which still weren't taking her down but clearly were causing her pain and stalling her from retaliating.

"Or that's what you want to believe!" Uranus shouted, punching at him, but Negi blocking her fist with a barrier. This made him briefly drop the attack though, enough for her to bring her hands up together and shout, "WORLD! SHAKIN'!" before slamming them down on the ground, creating a massive, speeding force blast that threw Negi off his feet and on his back. "Hah, how d'ya like that, you lil' pipsqueak with a complex?!" She swung an arm around to swat an electric blast from Chisame's scepter and the deflected attack flew right over the head of an Asuna who had to duck under it.

"Hey! I'm not going to bet on being magically invulnerable to THAT, be more careful, Chisame!" the redhead protested.

"Of course, when there's a lack of actual parents to shape a child," Uranus continued her analysis while slamming a foot down on Negi's chest, and aiming he outstretched hand at Chisame, Matoi and Haruna, "sometimes third parties will look to take their place, moved by misplaced feelings of guilt or simple desires to prove themselves worth a traditional family role. However, children are simply unable to look after other children, so those attempts are doomed to cause nothing but further psychological damage on the-"

"You couldn't even look after yourself!" Negi pointed out, catching her ankle in a leg grab and then twisting her down against the floor, then to quickly grab her arms from behind. "Just give up already!"

"This... is strangely exciting, why should I stop when the going's gettin' good...?" Harley moaned from under him as he pinned her down, stradling her back and pondering how much power to use on her. He was afraid of both hurting her too badly and of not hurting her enough as to keep her down, but it was hard to see how resistant a Senshi really was without ever fighting one before. Maybe he should have asked Master to allow Akira, Minako-san and Shiho-san into the resort...

"Your girlfriend's just the worst," Asuna said after finally finishing the last of Neptune's vines, her clothes tattered as she faced the renegade Sailor Guardian herself. "But then, I doubt you care, right?"

"If you think she's the worst, you haven't seen much of the world, little girl," Neptune smiled.

"I don't want to see much of YOUR world, at least," Asuna groaned, training the sword on her. "Okay, now let's stop pretending. I'm not getting close, I know touching you is dangerous, and I don't need to anyway. You really don't want to risk your neck for the Joker, I can cut through any vines you send at me, and if you shoot me with magic, I can undo that as well, so why don'tcha just step aside and let us see the big turd himself? Walk away for all I care, as long as it's far away enough..."

"Asuna-san!" Negi gasped while struggling to keep the squirming Harley down. "These people are criminals, they must be delivered to the police!"

"Negiiii!" Asuna whined. "Let the police and Batman-sama take care of that, okay?! We're here for Honya and Yue and nothing else, what's with trying to play cop right now? Aren't you always big on how mages shouldn't interfere with human affairs?"

"Kagurazaka's right, Sensei," Chisame sighed, stepping closer while Matoi helped Haruna along. "Besides, no jail in Japan can hold these weirdos, let them go back to America where they belong..."

"Reeeeeed!" Uranus cried out. "Put a fight again, these brats want to hurt Mistah J!"

Neptune shrugged. "Now I know they're willing to let us walk away, why do I care?"

"Ivyyyyyyyy!"

"You should listen to them," Mordred said from the chamber's entrance, tossing the beaten down, armless and groaning Quartum in their midst, earning shocked gasps from Negi, Chisame and Matoi. Next to the Servant, Lala and Artoria helped Shirou march in, with Karin and Chachamaru holding a knocked out Tsukuyomi between them. "I wouldn't have been so generous with my offer!" she cracked a grin within the dark confines of her helmet.

Uranus bopped her fists against the floor in frustration. "I knew we should've brought Croc along!"

"He'd just have thrown a rock at them," Neptune replied icily.

"Yeah, but it'd have been a big rock! Who knows, it might've worked!"

"I'm fine, thanks for asking!" Quartum roared from his pool of blood. 

* * *

"Well, it's time," the Joker breathed in as the alarms stopped sounding. Even the Heartless creatures had stopped their restless squirming, standing straight in attention towards the sealed door. Joker tugged on his colorful bowtie a few times, and fixed on his best Sunday grin. "It's been fun, gals, but one way or another you're leaving soon, so I guess you must be happy now."

"I'm inwardly setting off rockets and cheering maniacally," Yue monotoned.

The Joker laughed, almost quietly for his standards. "You'll be a wonderful straightwoman to someone's act someday, despite not being straight. Unless, of course, I kill you first. Wouldn't that just ruin Negi's day, to get here after all that hassle, only to find all three of you with bullet holes through your heads?"

"Why me too?!" Touko cried.

"Because you literally stink?" Joker shrugged. "Seriously, girl, I'd rather spend three whole days in Killer Moth's old cell, after he mutated and left all that icky goo behind, than two more hours with you here. I think you'll smell less after you're a corpse, it's not like you can smell any worse..."

"Negi-sensei would kill you," Nodoka said.

"And I am straight!" Yue added. "Totally straight! Yay boys and stuff!"

"Don't be silly, you aren't straight, I can tell, and as for the other thing, well, I can't die yet, didn't you know?" he chuckled, while Temptress, knowing better than that, rolled her eyes quietly. "I can't die unless Batman kills me. That's the way the world works. I'm practically a member of UQ Holder!" He shivered in disgust.

"Don't be so sure, you always could be surprised," the small Servant said as she walked over to Nodoka and cruelly tugged on one of her cheeks. "Miyazaki? Before we part ways, one way or another, let me tell you I never really liked you."

"Mutual..." Nodoka replied, taking the pain in stride.

"Oh, you did, but you'll understand that later, if it's fated to be." She stepped back to stand next to the tube holding the sleeping figure, and stood her ground while the Joker readied his crowbar in a hand and an extra long, comically so even, handgun in the other. "Now hold on to your chairs, they'll be here in three, two-"

The already mentioned door was violently hit from the outside, then plummeted down before them.

"Well, just look at that!" Temptress sighed. "He never ceases to betray my expectations, for better or worse..."

"Don't whine, you were off for only one second, you're still perfect soulmates," Joker teased acidly. "At least he doesn't break in shattering perfectly good fine skylights, like some other people I know...!"

Then they entered the room, Negi leading the group, aiming ahead with his staff to sighs of recognition and relief from Nodoka, and humming pensiveness of Yue. "Joker!" the boy mage commanded, with the rest of his rescue team solidly gathered behind them carrying their captives. "It's all over now! Hand those students over safe and sound or face the consequences!"

"Even more than you will as things stand now!" Lala completed the idea for him.

The Heartless, never creatures known for their restraint or respect for dramatic conventions based around human interaction, instantly leapt from the Joker's sides towards Negi's throat, with inhuman, manic sounds of dark glee.

And that was the beginning of the end. Or the end of this chapter, anyway. See you around next time. 

* * *

**To be Continued**.

* * *

 ** **Omake: I Was a Teenaged Step-Mom to the Knight of Treachery**.**

When it was all said and done, Mordred looked very seriously at Shirou and finally, when he was about to ask her what was going on, she dryly told him, "Okay. Your fighting skills are still comically laughable, your tactical acumen is as bad as I feared, and you simply luck out on the battlefield, relying on skills you aren't even worthy of. Still, I'll admit your devotion to Father is powerful, and that you'd gladly die for him. Since a wife's not required to be a great fighter but a devoted and sacrificing spouse, I'm willing to call you Step-Mother."

Shirou blinked. "Say what?"

Mordred nodded austerely. "Make no mistake, my actual mother was not a person worthy of any love, so don't think I'm honoring you by granting you this title. I'm just saying I won't hold it against you if you want to think of me as your son. I'm used to having unworthy parents, and you, at the very least, are a courageous man."

"If I'm a man, why am I your mother?" he babbled.

"... go ask Father," she grumbled. "Sheesh, you haven't actually noticed it, have you?"

"Noticed what?"

"Mordred!" Artoria coughed uneasily from the sidelines, stoically staring off into the distance.

"Anyway," Mordred mumbled to Shirou, "don't expect any gifts for Mother's Day, okay?"

"Why should I?!" he protested.

"Right," Mordred nodded. "Nice to hear you're not going to demand that much recognition. Well then, treat me to dinner, I'm your step-son after all."

"How comes I'm obligated to you as your stepmother, but you're not obligated to me as my son?!"

Mordred sneered. "What a cheapskate! Fine, then, forget I said anything, it's not like I want any of your repulsive, watered down festival food..."

"Festival food?!" Shirou cried. "Wait, if I were to treat you as a stepson I'd never feed you food from a festival booth! A son of mine would deserve a well-made home-cooked meal!"

Mordred stared blankly at him. "Don't tell me you have Father slave away at your kitchen! Not that he would know the first thing about cooking anyway!"

"Mordred," Artoria said, "actually, he is-"

Wounded in his culinary pride, Shirou put a hand to his chest. "I'm perfectly capable of cooking on my own, and no step-son of mine is going to throw his step-mother's cooking capacity into doubt! Come here, your mother's going to show you what a real meal tastes like! Honestly, an Englishman of all people lecturing me on cooking...!"

* * *

Despite herself, Mordred's eyes grew starry and wide after the first mouthful, and then her head violently whipped aside to look at Ritsuka, who ate quietly in the seat by hers. "Why can't you be a wife as good as Father's, Master?" she asked him.

Ritsuka sighed miserably. "Maybe it's just because I haven't had any children yet."

"Oh, that can be fixed very quickly, I'm sure...!" Kiyohime teased right before Tamamo viciously leapt on her. **  
**

* * *

 **The Ten Origins of Unequally Rational and Emotional Hawkman**.

 **One:**

The Mage of the Beginning pulled his hood back while Negi gasped. "Yes, Negi," he said. "I am your father."

At the back of the Ala Alba gathered team, while everybody else gulped in horror and shock, Kotaro simply extended a hand towards Rito. The older boy sighed, pulled his wallet out, and began putting yen bills on Kotaro's palm.

"However!" Nagi said as he put on a bird mask and large bird wings sprouted from his back. "I'm also Hawkman, long lost prince of Thanagar! Now kill me."

Negi blinked. "Eh, killing you?! But why?!"

"Just keeping track of my own past is so bloody difficult it's become a neverending nightmare, why did you think this bitch took over my body so easily? Now hurry up, before this shit is retconned aga-"

* * *

 **Two:**

"Oh, look, Jon!" Martha Kent said joyfully, pulling the large egg wrapped in blankets out of the fallen ship's wreckage. "It's a baby...!"

Jonathan Kent blinked. "Um, Martha, that's no baby, that's just some kind of-"

"I think I'll call him Carter!"

Two days later they found another ship, this time with an actual, super strong baby inside.

And then another, with a rabid kid with a monkey tail who wrecked their car and then stupidly flew into a mad rampage across the fields, until stupidly falling down a gorge and hitting his head against the rocky ground. He was much better behaved after that.

And then they found a lovable but irritating wisecracking furry small child inside of another ship, who promptly ate their cat and-

* * *

"Frieza, I know blowing planets up is a lot of fun," King Cold wagged his finger at his child, "but seriously, at this rate we'll run out of subjects in no time! Why don't you take to stamp collecting, like Cooler, instead?"

* * *

 **Three:**

"I am Servant Berserker. I ask of you, are you my Master?"

The young Zouken swallowed and then straightened himself, determined to look his best before this muscular, strange winged entity he had just summoned. "Yes. Yes, I am. In turn I demand of you, what is your true identity?"

"Well, my legend has grown muddled through the mists of time. I might be Katar Hol, patrolman from planet Thanagar. I might be Prince Khufu of Egypt, reincarnated into archaelogist Carter Hall. I might be a combination of those two men. I might be Carter Kent, long lost child of a dead planet raised by kindly Kansas farmers along my brothers Gordon, Clark and Percy. I might be a gender challenged visitor from the future, trapped in a world he never made. I might be an alien prince married to a Martian princess and then-"

"Okay, this is what I get out of trying to cheat by using multiple catalysts at the same time," a contrite Zouken said.

* * *

 **Four:**

"... oh," Wonder Woman said as the Winged Warrior from the future entered the room. "We, um, sorry, we had all assumed you'd keep on being Hawkgirl, or that you would graduate to Hawkwoman instead..."

"It's okay, I don't mind," Kuromaru shrugged, while Green Lantern hurriedly used her ring to change the birthday cake's frosting while Batman muttered 'I told you so' to her. "It's just I realized, I'll most likely never go back, and without Konoe-kun, there was no point to the other alternative..."

* * *

 **Five:**

Spider-Man was nearly aghast. "A clone, really?!"

Hawkgirl nodded uneasily. "Why he thought it'd be more useful if he changed its gender, I don't know, however. Frankly, I feel somewhat insulted on top of everything else..."

"Well, what else can you expect from a guy calling himself the Jackal while dressing up like a giant green furry frog instead?"

* * *

 **Six:**

"HAAAAAAAAAAAWKMAAAAAAAAAAAAN!"

As he shot up flying away with that powerful yell, the two superheroes left behind shared a groan of annoyance.

"Why did he feel he had to change his name, I wonder?" Blue Falcon said.

Space Ghost shrugged. "I heard he lost some sort of lawsuit with Michael Keaton. Some bigshot lawyer..."

* * *

 **Seven:**

"Okay, Setsuna-san, any more long lost secret relatives you haven't told us about?" Asuna patiently asked.

The Shinmeiryuu master shook her head awkwardly. "No, I don't think so, at least..."

* * *

 **Eight:**

"Hawkmon, Digivolve!" Miyako said, happy her Digimon had finally gained enough of a level to do so.

"Hawkmon Digivolve to... HAWKMAN!" the small bird creature shouted, quickly changing into a tall, muscular and shirtless masked man with rock hard pecs, wide feathered wings, and a huge honking mace in a hand.

Miyako looked up and down at him, then told Mimi, "I'm sorry, Sempai. I think I might be straight after all!"

Daisuke stared on, blushing. "I... I'm thinking the opposite right now, actually..."

* * *

 **Nine:**

"Throw him out," the Wicked Witch callously told the winged monkey who had just brought the hairless baby to her attention. "It's defective."

Thankfully the abandoned baby was found and raised by either Jack Rakan, Luna Inverse, the La Vallieres, Rapunzel's parents looking for a child to compensate their loss, or maybe all of them at some point or another. I don't know. The story's unclear even there.

* * *

 **Ten:**

"Actually, all of those pasts of yours were true," Sailor Pluto told her visitor, before calmly blowing on her cup of coffee and taking a first sip. "I'm sorry, Mister Hol. Or Hall. Or Kent. Or-"

Hawkman screamed in utter, complete frustration, taking both hands to his head, before jumping out the window of Ritsuko's apartment in despair.

And then, well, he flew away, because duh.

"Bet the bastard will never pay me that window," predicted the Mistress of Time bitterly.


	14. Bare your Soul

_The Future:_

Sakurame Kirie tensed up, gasping. "Oh my God," she gasped. "It's happening."

"What's happening?" Ritsuko blinked, even as the small blonde hopped off the table and looked out the window, prompting most Servants and the young Master to follow. As they stared outside they saw a large black tear spreading through the starkly red sky as powerful gales of wind ravaged the already devastated Academy grounds, uprooting the few remaining trees and lampposts and sending them flying up towards the all consuming gorge suctioning everything below. "Oh wow, just look at that, the sky grew a gigantic monster vagina and is now eating the whole world up, I'm sure I won't ever be able to unsee that..."

Boudicca winced. "Neither will I, now. Thank you so very much, Master."

"You're welcome," Ritsuko said with a shrug of shoulders. "Okay, so we either fell into the Oz Singularity, we're already meeting the naughty nun who wants to stick the whole planet up her pussy, or something's striking that key change in the past you want us to alter, right?"

"The third one," Kirie grimaced.

"Bummer, I'd have liked the nun scenario better," Ritsuko commented. "So how do we jump back there and save the day, then?"

"I'm not sure," Kirie confessed. With a heavy sigh, she pulled out a large knife and held it before herself. "Once, when I was jumping through time, I left a 'save point' back there, but for all I know I might have lost it after the timelines shifted. It's the most likely thing, actually. I might kill myself for good doing this, that's not an easy thing to ponder..."

Ritsuko blinked. "What, wait, are you going to stab yourself in the throat?! You little psycho (and that's coming from someone who knows), you shouldn't waste your cute loli life away like that! I know things look bad right now, but that's no excuse, really! Here, let's have sex to drive away those horrid thoughts…"

"I don't know, suicide may very well be the most honorable exit under this kind of circumstances, Praetor," Nero observed.

"You took the coward's way out!" Boudicca accused.

"I did not!" Nero fumed. "It takes a lot of courage to stab yourself through the neck!"

"You only did it yourself because your slave chickened out of it!" Blavatsky reminded her.

Nero blushed, looking away. "I, I only asked him first because an Emperor's hands should not be awash with blood unless it is the absolute last resource, that is all! I am not Uncle Caligula or mother after all!"

"You're misunderstanding!" Kirie snapped. "I have an unique skill, where whenever I am killed, I can reset myself, and others with me, back towards a save point I set up in the past. Back when I worked with Ala Alba in the timeline I once crashed, I made sure to leave one such point behind, but-"

"By now it must be completely erased, yes," Urd grimly answered while Ishtar nodded. "Were you to kill yourself now, you wouldn't be sent back there, and even in the best case, you wouldn't be sent to the time period where we need being now."

"Then all is lost," Kirie sighed bitterly. "What a joke, having several of history's greatest at my side now, and we still can't get anything done, how incompetent are we being...!"

"Don't blame us for your own shortcomings on being in the right place at the right time, please," Raikou asked.

"There may be a chance yet, however," Ishtar said with a smile, as the window's frame was ripped off by the storms and sent up shooting upward, Helena and Nitocris following it up with sheepish gazes. "My divine spirit can synch into the past self of this body I'm inhabiting! We gods exist out of time, after all!"

Urd blinked. "Um, Ish-chan? It's not the same Tohsaka Rin you're driving around now, I told you that already, and even if she were, it's not like we can do that kind of astral projection without a proper setup, and that only would guarantee _your_ escape from this dead end, not ours..."

"Well, I'm the most important person present, after all," Ishtar candidly said.

"Why can't you go back the same way you showed up at Chaldea?" Ritsuko groaned.

"That's not the same thing at all, that was a dimensional displacement, not a time- Hey, what about the Cassiopeia you showed us before?" Urd asked Kirie, as Nero caught on a flying book that was being sucked outwards. She fancied herself a patron of the fine literary arts, after all. "Can't we use it to head back then?"

Kirie sighed, handing her the golden watch. "You're welcome to try! But it's the one Negi Springfield had on him when disaster struck, I found it literally on what remained of him, and looks like it'd sustained serious damage, so I don't think I could make it work..."

"Well, this place's leylines are damaged beyond repair by now," Urd grumbled, fumbling around with the Cassiopeia, "but these are simple three-dimensional continuum physics, for a goddess they're nothing, even if I specialized in Potions. I'm sure I can, on my own- hmmmm, Ish, can you lend me a hand here?"

"I warn you I've never been that good with modern machinery, and this body seems to react badly to the mere idea of them," Ishtar cautioned as she came closer regardless, taking a good look over Urd's shoulders. "Okay, but I think I can work with this after all. Looks like that tinker toy Dad gave me for my seventh birthday, the one to reverse and rewind the cycles of life and death. Miss Ritsuko? You might want to call Astolfo and Lord Vlad here quickly, we might have to do an emergency jump soon enough..."

"Astolfo's right here!" Ritsuko peppily said as Babbage reached up, easily catching the much smaller pink-haired Servant as he too was being blown out with a girlish yelp and holding his skirt down. "Uncle Vlaaaaaaad!" she called out towards the next room. "C'me here a moment, pleez...! Whatcha doin' back there, trying on new dresses?"

The grim Berserker strode out indignantly, above the mayhem of random household items being flown away, and holding several of Chiu's best costumes against his strong chest. "Master! Will you stop mistaking my admiration for the fine arts of sewing with an improper desire to wear these things myself!" Then he chivalrously presented them to her. "On the other hand, you would look most lovely in them, I am sure..."

"Oh, Uncle Vlad..." Ritsuko purred, accepting the gift as Nero, who was holding her in place so she wouldn't be whisked away, umu-ed to herself in annoyance. "That's so nice of you, I'd love to... Ohhhh, Uncle, a Playboy bunny outfit...! You naughty Uncle, you've been spending time with your counterpart, haven't you...!"

"My apologies, I must have picked that one by mistake," Vlad piously said.

"And a nurse cosplay, too...!"

"Well, you mentioned a desire to get closer to Lady Nightingale as well, so I thought-"

"And this one! It's so sexy and scandalous, I don't know how I could possibly-!"

"Finish with that aberration already, false gods!" an angry Nero called back over her shoulder. "The sooner we leave this forsaken place the better, it is corrupting the Impaler as we speak...!"

* * *

 **You Broke my Heart with Fanservice.**

Based on Works by Akamatsu Ken, Kodansha and others.

Proofread and Edits by Shadow Crystal Mage.

* * *

 **Chapter Fourteen: Bare your Soul.**

* * *

As he fell, Negi Springfield instinctively knew this was not the first time he had that dream. A dream of falling through darkness, with the bandaged wooden staff he had received from his father in his hand. Negi's small, light body felt more like it was slowly floating down than anything else, as an icy chill caressed the skin of his exposed face, chest, legs and arms. The rest of his body was covered by the shorts and open jacket he'd been wearing through the Mahora Festival so far.

He vaguely remembered a few passages from one of the stories his sister Nekane loved to tell him, back in the peaceful hills of Wales.

 _'Well!' thought Alice to herself, 'after such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of tumbling down stairs! How brave they'll all think me at home! Why, I wouldn't say anything about it, even if I fell off the top of the house!' (Which was very likely true.)_

Negi was not afraid. He was a brave young man, and the events that had transpired around him since his arrival to Mahora had only further steeled his resolve and courage. He also fancied himself a rational mind, for the standards of the magical community at least, so he was fairly sure there was something impossible about the current scenario he was living through. Last thing he remembered before that was facing the Joker and demanding for the release of Yue-san and Nodoka-san, in some underground catacombs under the Mahora World Tree. Then some demons or Orphans, he hadn't been able to study them closely yet, had jumped on him, and he rationalized they had knocked him out or some manner of Joker or Scarecrow toxin had induced a hallucination upon him. However, for some reason, he was not waking up yet, as was the custom whenever he realized what he was dreaming at the time just couldn't be possible.

Still, he felt no fear, but an acute sense of annoyance.

 _Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end! "I wonder how many miles I've fallen by this time?" she said aloud. "I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the Earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think—" (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a very good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) "-yes, that's about the right distance-but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I've got to?" (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)_

Negi realized his eyes had been closed, and he opened them again, hoping that would wake him up, but it made no difference, for everything around him remained darkness, with only a pinpoint of white light faintly glowing as high as his gaze could go. He tried reaching for it with the hand that wasn't holding his staff, but it was as pointless as he had expected it to be, although now his fall seemed to be growing faster, as punctuated by the increased force of the cold air hitting his face and messing his dark red hair up.

"Chisame," he said, calling out with a very weak voice.

 _Down, down, down. There was nothing else to do, so Alice soon began talking again. "Dinah'll miss me very much to-night, I should think!" (Dinah was the cat.) "I hope they'll remember her saucer of milk at tea-time. Dinah my dear! I wish you were down here with me! There are no mice in the air, I'm afraid, but you might catch a bat, and that's very like a mouse, you know. But do cats eat bats, I wonder?"_

 _And here Alice began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself, in a dreamy sort of way, `Do cats eat bats? Do cats eat bats?' and sometimes, `Do bats eat cats?' for, you see, as she couldn't answer either question, it didn't much matter which way she put it. She felt that she was dozing off, and had just begun to dream that she was walking hand in hand with Dinah, and saying to her very earnestly, `Now, Dinah, tell me the truth: did you ever eat a bat?' when suddenly, thump! thump! down she came upon a heap of sticks and dry leaves, and the fall was over._

And just like that, barely hurting his behind as he landed on it, Negi reached the bottom of the abyss.

The boy sat up, and now he could see something; he could see thanks to the lights emanating from the floor, which was covered by a variety of stained glass portraits, each one decorated with the face of a different, attractive young woman. Later Negi could not remember the exact details of each girl's face, however, except for the one displayed on the portrait right before his face. It was a gorgeous face that combined the vitality of youth with the stern demeanor of maturity, framed by a long golden mane, and sparkling at its middle with the mismatched bright of a blue eye and a green eye.

Just like Asuna-san's eyes.

 _"This,"_ a deep, strong male voice told him, _"is your heart."_

"My heart?" Negi repeated, thinking he had heard that voice before.

 _"So much to do, and so little time…"_ the voice mused, seeming to come from everywhere at once. _"The times are upon you now, Negi. The times where you will have to fight."_

"I have fought already," he said, standing up. "I have even faced and defeated the Queen of the Night, Evangeline, and… and the demon who destroyed our village…."

 _"Your fights haven't started yet, Negi,"_ the voice said. _"Evangeline had mercy on you. Those waiting ahead for you will not. Protect those around you, and allow them to protect you as well. Only that way, you'll prevail where I failed. Don't make the same mistakes I made."_

"The mistakes you…?" the young boy gulped, sweating despite how cold he was feeling. "Are you…?"

Negi felt a chill running down his spine, and then several of the glass panels flew in pieces, spraying sharp shards all around him, forcing him to back away on staggering feet, shielding himself with a sleeve and the staff. From the new holes on the floor, more of those small creatures rose, surrounding him quickly from all directions. Their bodies were dark and almost featureless, armed with long, clawed limbs; and their faces were marked by nothing but red glowing eyes above large, crooked grins full of long fangs.

Now Negi did feel a bit of fear.

But his battle instincts, that had been honed lately, during his training under the Vampire Witch of legend, took over for him almost instantly. _"Rastel Maskir Magister!"_ he chanted. _"Veniant Spiritus Aeriales Fulgurantes!"_ he added, and shot a barrage of lightning bolt discharges from his staff at the beings who were charging towards him.

The dark creatures flew in all directions, away from him, but while a few dissipated into shadows from the impact, the largest of them rose back and ran towards Negi, waving their members threateningly.

 _"Jovis Tempestas Fulguriens!"_ Negi growled, with a raw ferocity that bubbled up his chest, taking aim at the group of attackers and hitting them squarely with a wave of blinding light projectiles that skewered the menacing beings, destroying the remainder of them. However, the discharge shook him as well, and sent him down to his knees, forcing him to support himself on the staff, panting for air. "I'm…" he said between pants, "I'm not strong enough, not yet…"

 _"Live strong, but mostly, live happy, Negi,"_ the friendly, warm voice told him. _"And don't ever live alone. Find your mother, and make her happy as well. For she is the Key… one of the Keys…"_

"What?" Negi blinked, his lower lip trembling. "My mother? I thought my mother was dead, that's what everyone told me at the village, why are you telling me this…?"

 _"Now, it is time to wake up,"_ the voice said. _"But never let your dream die. And remember; a little courage is the true magic."_

"Father!" Negi cried, working back to his feet. "Father, wait! Don't let me-!"

The whole of the floor shattered, and once again, the darkness swallowed Negi, as there was nothing to hold him under his feet anymore.

 _"You will open the door, my son."_

And then he woke up.

* * *

When Negi Springfield came back to his senses from strange dreams, he found himself standing amidst a flurry of quickly dissipating black specks floating down from seemingly nothingness, with his allies behind him, and the only two enemies left standing before them being the Joker and Temptress. He was also not a cockroach, thus completing the Kafka reference. Because it had been a while.

He recognized what the small black pieces were as he watched them vanish in silence, wondering what had just come to his mind through that vision. Had the events of the day taken a toll on his psyche? Was this a sign he needed to get more restful sleep at night? Did he unknowingly have a Force Bond with a yonug-Snape look-alike contest winner? Maybe he needed a rest badly before he lost his mind, or perhaps, as was his first guess through the elaborate hallucination, the Joker or the Scarecrow had planted mind-altering toxins in the room...

"Well, that was savage, Negi," Joker shook his head with a faint air of disapproval. "Not gentlemanly at all, you behaved like a brute! It was like watching the Penguin eating after boasting about how cultured and Shakesperean he was, yes, same thing...!"

"Enough of that, clown," Asuna warned tensely, keeping her sword raised as she nudged her head towards Harley and Ivy, who were being held by Chachamaru and Lala with Haruna-created manacles around their the were Haruna-created, it twisted them into a vaguely-BDSM pretzel that prevented them from using their strength and powers, or at least from from using them in a useful direction. "You're outnumbered, and even if you've pulled some supervillain crap like-"

"I've planted explosives set to blow up at my command if my precious sacred life's threatened," the Joker interrupted.

"Yeah, even if you try something like that, you're still outnumbered and surrounded, with your back against the wall and only a weak-ass Servant to fight for you!" Asuna barked. "Give it up, it's not like you want to die away from your dear, muscular, sexy Batman-sama, right?"

"That'd certainly be very unbecoming," Joker agreed, nodding thoughtfully and rubbing his long chin. He smirked whimsically. "I've always been a lover first, a fighter second, anyway! And a showman above all those things! You see, Negi... look this way, Negi, what are you, dizzy?... I'm not here to kill you. Oh, some very bad people wanted me to do that, alright, but now, I'm not such a bad guy after all! It's like I was telling Nodoka and Yue here-"

"Don't listen to him, Sensei!" Yue said. "He's going to try and trick you!"

"Like that would be hard," Joker mused aloud. "But! I come here to tell no lies! I'm not out to fool anyone today! This time I'm a White Knight, a Clown Prince of Good Deeds! I'm going to give you the big truth behind the secret curtain, Negi-kins!"

Negi grunted. "Just let the girls go, Joker-san."

The clown shrugged. "If that's so important to you, sure thing. Temptress, if you'll do the honors?"

"Why should I do it?" the cute little person pouted.

"Well, I'm too important for menial tasks, Harl and Red are kinda tied up and kinky at the moment, Quarty has no hands period, and Yomi's taking her much needed beauty sleep. What kind of non-serving Servant are you anyway? Do I need to bring Ruri here so she can do it instead?"

Temptress sighed, placing herself behind the chairs of Touko, Yue and Nodoka, and releasing them in that order. As soon as she did, a sneering Fukawa spun around and slapped her, only to rub her hand in pain just as soon. "Eeeeeee! Are you made of steel?!"

"You idiot, even the weakest Servant is still far stronger than an average human like you, except for Mata Hari, who just sucks," Temptress blandly replied before shooing them away with a hand, Nodoka grabbing the author's hand and pulling her with them towards Negi's side. "Aren't you staying for a little longer after this?"

Negi kept his staff trained on them. "Stay right where you are! The local authorities will be contacted by now, so don't think of-"

"That would be a bad idea, Negster," Joker matter-of-factly said. "You shouldn't be here in the first place, so if they learn you were ever here, mission of mercy or not, you'll still be turned into an ermine, lowest and filthiest of all creatures short of the Bat and the Twitard! And that's if you're lucky!"

Chamo twitched. "Even you, huh..."

"Let's make something clear," Joker raised, raising his hands so they could clearly see he was not holding anything in them as he dropped his weapons. "Normally, we couldn't have set shop here to begin with. This is supposed to be the most heavily sealed and warded place in the whole Academy, and the most secretive too, to a degree even most magical teachers don't know about it. We only could get through under Cucumber Head's nose because of Temptress' hacks."

The cat-eared Servant nodded proudly. "I happen to be quite familiar with these security measures!"

"How so?" Chisame asked, feeling quite upset at this twerp's arrogant superiority. What a smug little bitch, and adding to the annoyance, Matoi was starting to stare quite deeply at her, not that Chisame cared.

"Like a not so great man said, that's a secret, sorry," Temptress wagged a finger. "Just like the identity of the man inside of this tomb, but Joker thinks that one, we can share. It's not like I care much one way or the other, so I went along with it..."

"Why should we care about some nobody buried under the school?" Asuna asked, while Yue and Nodoka gathered around Haruna and nervously checked on her bruises and wounds. "What, is it some other bozo they sent to sleep underground, like we did with that perverted Count?"

Joker looked into Negi's eyes, and then simply said, "Call them, kid."

Negi blinked. "Who?"

"Your partners, all of them," Joker explained, as if talking to a very slow child. "This is the big moment, the middle-of-the-plot climax where the whole shebang for the second half is set up, so all the major players need to be gathered, of course! Besides, it'll save you a whole lot on explanations later on."

"You... You must be kidding!" Asuna gasped. "On top of all of us, you want the whole rest of us to band together on your white skinny butt, too?!"

"This might be a trap," Karin warned. "Actually, I'm fully convinced it is."

"His pulse's steady, as is his heartbeat. I doubt he's lying," Chachamaru said. "He really wants all of us here..."

"That still doesn't deny the certain possibility of a trap, you dumb machine!" Karin protested.

"You will respect all of my students, please, Karin-san," Negi huffed. "Chachamaru-san, are there any toxins or mind altering compounds released into the air as we speak?"

"None that I can detect, Sensei."

The boy teacher nodded slowly. "I see..."

"Well?" the Clown Prince tapped on his cheek with two fingers, eyebrow raised. "Are we going to take all day long here? Because I'm not leaving without showing you what I went to all the effort to reveal to you, you entitled little special prince. I'd rather make the whole place go boom, I'll be back for the next loop anyway..."

Chisame blinked. "What was that? That last part?"

"Ignore him, he's just talking nonsense," Negi breathed out, steeling himself and pulling out Ayaka's Pactio card out. "Be warned, if I see you moving against my friends, you're going to wish you'd stayed in Gotham..."

"I think I'm already way past that stage," Joker petulantly said, fanning himself with a hand while Chachamaru's eyes widened suddenly, her head snapping towards the obscured containment tube. "I don't think I like this country a very lot, if I may be culturally insensitive en-"

"Negi-sensei!" Chachamaru shouted suddenly. "Please don't!"

But now Negi, with a strangely sharp look in his eyes, was pressing most of his deck against his forehead all at once, and was calling out with a strong voice, "Girls! Come forth, please!"

And there was a series of sudden flashes of white.

* * *

 _The Haunted House, Seconds Later:_

"Yuuna!" Akashi threw his hands up. "Where did he take my Yuuna?! Yuuna! Yuuna! Wherefore art thou, Yuuna?-!"

"Please don't quote Shakespeare like that, it makes the ass even more annoying to be around," Kiyohime said blandly.

Illyasviel gave him a flat, annoyed glare. "Where do you think? Maybe to the same place where he went to, on a dangerous mission against madmen that might have required backup?"

"Yes, there!" the teacher shouted, scared out of his mind. "Why'd he do such a thing?!"

"... because that is what Ministra Magi are there for...?" Illya guessed again, now feeling better she hadn't had a father for most of her life after all. "Expendable meat shields protect more important magical people?"

"Negi! What happened to Negi?!" the Black Rose Baron shouted in a tone eerily similar to Wataru's as he stormed in from the next room at breakneck speed.

Fujimaru Ritsuka sighed wearily, still left in the room along with his Servants, a soured Evangeline, Akashi-sensei, Medea, Illya, Heracles, Sayoko, Nana, Momo and a frankly baffled Mami. "Let me guess. Sakurazaki-san and Konoe-san disappeared as well, along with those two nun girls at the front door with you?"

"Yeah, pretty much, and then this, ah, gentleman began freaking out," Kuchiki Rukia calmly explained, walking into the room as well with a bored looking Ichigo, who kept his hands in his pockets. "Don't worry about the entrance by the way, we left it in good hands..."

* * *

"I think I could like being in this club!" Orihime peppily grinned, slamming a seal on another ticket before ushering the newest customer in, all the while wearing the pointy black hat of a witch. "Wouldn't you, Chizuru-chan?"

Honsho-not-Naba, now with a black nekomimi set and matching fake tail on, sighed at her friend slash crush. "I don't know, Hime-chan. I can't get myself to like anyone in a denial as stupid as Sakurazaki-san's...!"

* * *

"... okay, sure thing, it's not my club after all," Kiyohime shrugged it off after a moment. "Why are you making such a big deal out of it? They are all warriors heading into another battle for their mutual love and loyalty, it's just plain silly to comp-"

"He/she is a child!" Akashi and the Baron violently replied at once.

"So is Nursery Rhyme-chan, and she's as brave a fighter as any of us!" Blackbeard protested, slamming himself on the chest with a fist, ever ready to protect the honor of one of his favorite lolis. "Don't underestimate the very young just because they are lovable and harmless looking!"

"Nursery Rhyme's no child, she's a book, though," Tamamo-no-Mae said.

"Well, how about Shuten-chan then?" Blackbeard asked.

"She's a centuries old demon! Who drinks more than you and Drake combined!" the fox tailed Caster snapped.

"Helena?"

"She's a grown woman! She just happens to be short!"

"Andersen?"

"When have you ever seen Andersen fight?"

"Abigail-chan?"

"We haven't gotten that far into the story yet."

"Sorry, it must be that primal insanity screwing with me through time itself," the pirate offered.

"At the very least," Momo smiled, "we know Lala's still alive because she just summoned Rito-san away too!"

"Yeah, and we know she isn't TOO bad either because she chose to summon the useless idiot instead of teleporting herself back here," Nana grouched.

"We must go look for them all the same!" Wataru said.

The Baron nodded. "Definitely! There's no time to waste!"

"And," Nana asked with a nasty smirk, "how do you plan to do that without Lala's tracking device?"

"Can't you make one of those for us?" Akashi asked her.

"I'm a zoologist, not a multidisciplinary inventor!" the princess replied. "And this is a botanist, so don't bother with her either!" she added, pointing at Momo.

Momo nodded. "Sorry! I guess there's nothing to do but wait here until events develop further, pulling us back into the insanity as well!"

"Maybe I should go look for that emaciated teacher and ask him if he has any extra rope," Nana grumbled at this notion, rubbing herself on the temples.

"That's an excellent idea, but please remember your elders go first," Ritsuka blandly said.

"Or," Mashu said, standing up, "you could join us as we look for the Demon Pillar instead of sitting here feeling sorry for yourselves and wondering about Negi-sensei."

"After all, there'll be no more world for Negi-sensei and Akashi-san to live in if you don't find that Demon Pillar thing... right?" Mami pointed out, slowly nodding and wondering if she was getting the whole gist of this lifestyle yet. It looked kind of fun, all things considered.

"Sorry, but my daughter's my top priority," Akashi said, heading towards the door with Medea and the Baron in close tow. "I wish you good luck, but if you can't help, I'll still go look around the World Tree anyway. They must be somewhere-"

"Wait, wait, I just had an idea," Nana sighed, standing up as well and dusting herself off. She always could respect a concerned father, being the most daddy-loving of the three sisters, so she couldn't help feeling bad for this girl. "I think I can help you find Lala and the others anyway, but first follow me out into the backyard, please."

"The backyard?" Ichigo repeated, blinking.

"Are you deaf, or or do you have a main character echo complex?" Nana asked, irritated. "How could I ask the earthworms about what's going on underground from indoors?"

"Ah, of course," Ichigo said, nodding. "Carry on, then."

"I'm having a conversation about talking with worms to find alien princesses and boy mages fighting clowns under the school, while drinking tea with Marie Antoinette-sama and Blackbeard the Pirate," Mami quietly said to herself, pondering her current situation once again.

Teach pouted, wounded to the bone. "Awwwwww, c'mon, little sister...! Don't tell me that makes you unhappy, being in poor ole Unca Edward's company...!"

"Oh goodness, please, no, don't be offended!" Mami gasped. "Sorry if I phrased that wrong, I'm just sad Sayaka-san and Kyoko-san aren't here to see all of this too...!" she romantically sighed, beginning to truly get into the spirit of things.

 _It's always the quiet ones_ , Rukia reflected, starting to get really worried about this girl, too.

"Wait, you're okay with having me around?" Blackbeard, looking like Mordred after Saber Lily said something nice to her. He burst into tears. "This usually never happens to me!"

* * *

"Okay, so what was the big emergency that needed all of us to be here? I was in the middle of a very important conversation!" Yuuna said as she trained her guns on the Joker, who simply rolled his eyes and held his hands over his head, looking more annoyed than upset over any of this. "Because all I can see is this skinny clown and this tiny little girl, you seem to have taken care of everyone already, so..."

"Didn't they also hang out with an old guy and a dummy, that dinosaur man, and those two creepy twins in black?" asked Misa while Rito rushed to Haruna's side screaming her name, running past a Lala who was too busy hugging a frowning Yue against her chest.

"We left them taking care of things in Kyoto," Joker said, "I mean, do you think it'd be practical smuggling a gigantic crocodile man into this school? And Yomi's murder harem just can't keep quiet long enough, this scheme would've fallen apart before it even started. And who wants to be near Old Fart and Pinocchio anyway? I know I don't!"

"Well, yeah, looks like your plan fell apart all the same, and this time we didn't even need Batman-sama for it," Asuna smirked, already thinking of how impressed he'd be after they delivered the creep to him. Maybe he'd ask her to become Batgirl Two or something, and not that she'd accept, her place was by Takahata-sensei, but it'd still be so nice just to be asked, ah...

"Maybe, maybe not, who knows?" Joker shrugged with a raspy chuckle. "Who's said the ride's over yet?"

"I think he's saved one trump card for the end, but I can't tell what it is," Negi frowned, keeping his staff raised defensively. "That's why I haven't moved to attack him yet. By the way, Chachamaru-san, were you saying something right before-?"

"I'm not too sure now," she admitted while recalibrating her instruments, standing alert, "but briefly, I thought I felt a trace bio signs inside of that container, Sensei. I think... whoever is there might be alive."

"Yes, that... that's what he was saying before you arrived," Nodoka shared, reluctant to say much more. Behind her, Konoka was healing Haruna much to Rito's relief, and it was truly strange to see a situation where Konoka was sporting more of a blissfully... strange expression than Haruna. "D-Doesn't mean it's the truth, we know what kind of man he is, but-"

"Why don't you tell him the rest of it while you're at it?" Joker said cheerfully. "Go on, I'll wait and star in a movie or something while you do that."

Negi blinked. "The rest of what?"

"You're Negi Springfield, right?" Touko asked. "He said that man in there is y-"

Yue quickly blocked her mouth with a hand. "Don't. You're just playing into his hands!"

Negi frowned. "Yue-san?"

"Sensei, whatever this man says can't be taken at face value!" Yue accused, pointing at Joker with a finger while her other hand remained tight around a muffled and angry Touko's mouth. "He just wants to confuse and mislead you, since he knows you're the purest of us all!"

"You mean, 'easily gullible dupe'," Joker said helpfully.

"Highly arguable," Satomi frowned, a hand resting on Chachamaru's side for emphasis.

"Actually, I agree with Satomi-san in this, Chachamaru-san's never been a supervillain, but- What is he supposed to be tricking me with?" Negi asked. "Don't worry, I'll never be dumb enough to outright unconditionally believe anything he-"

"NNOOOOOOOO!-!-!-!-!-!-!" the librarians and Chisame all cried, too late.

"That's your dad in there," Temptress pronounced the deadly words, simply poking a thumb at the tube, and everybody else fell into a stunned, shocked silence, except for the librarisn, who were facepalming. Even Setsuna, who had been too busy roughly poking the unconscious Tsukuyomi's nose for the last couple minutes with a strangely spaced out pleased smile on her face and looking speculatively at a marker pen. All but Touko, who simply shouted an angry storm when Yue released her mouth as she needed that hand to facepalm now. And Nodoka, who simply melted in place. And the Joker himself, naturally, who only pouted ridiculously.

"Bummer, Tempy...! I wanted to say that...!"

"Maybe in your next life," the small Servant half-shrugged, then looked expectantly at Negi, waiting for his reaction, stopping her breathing for a long, tense moment until he...

* * *

Negi, to everyone's surprise, broke into a subdued, shaky, small chuckle. "No, really?" he said, like he was commenting on a cheap pun. "Really?"

Joker blinked. "Not believing it at all, not even a bit intrigued?"

"Of, of course not!" Negi lifted his head again, his face not shadowed by his hair in a suitably creepy fashion anymore. That was compensated by how deranged his eyes were looking now, however, as if he'd been given George Lucas Special Edition CGI 'Enhancements'. "How can you expect me to believe that, that nonsense?! Why would my father be buried under Mahora Academy?! First of all, he couldn't be here without the Headmaster and Takamichi knowing, and they'd never do that to me!"

"True, true!" Asuna nodded rapidly.

"All too true!" Konoka agreed.

"It certainly makes no sense at all," Setsuna added. "Besides, this has all the appearances of a sealing burial intended to keep a great evil vanquished. Hardly fitting a great hero of justice like the Thousand Master."

"There's that, too," Negi said. "Well said, Setsuna-san. So!" he shouted, aiming his staff at the tube, "We've got to expose that lie by shattering that object and revealing the creature inside, who is in absolutely no way my father...!"

Matoi blinked. "You're suggesting we should unleash what you believe might be a demon or evil presence just so you can check it's not your father, Negi-sama? That's very unlike you."

Negi trembled a bit. "I... I know that... Sorry, I don't know what came over to me..."

There was a long, awkward silence, during which Joker began picking his nose quite thoroughly and wiped it on his pants.

"So... what are we going to do with this thing anyway?" Rito ended up sighing.

"What else? Let's leave it behind where it belongs, buried and forgotten, and never bring it up again, that's the only half-sane response!" Chisame decided. "Right, Sensei?"

"Uh... yes?" Negi said. "Sure?"

"Yeah, it's quite obvious by now this is just a ploy of the Joker to get you shatter that hideous thing and unleash whatever there is inside for him," Sora opined.

Matoi gasped. "Ah! Sister-in-law! You were there?!"

The college student nodded. "Yes, why wouldn't I? Sensei just summoned all of his partners, remember?"

"Well, it's just you're always so quiet, and I think you hadn't even shown up in the storyarc before this..." Misa pointed out.

"She hasn't, I haven't ever seen this woman before," Mordred confirmed.

"A-hem!" Chisame coughed forcefully while Sora paled hideously, hit hard by her lack of relevance. "Will you stop bullying my easily forgettable sister so we can concentrate on securing these weirdos and leaving this place already?"

"Even you Chisame?-!" Sora wailed.

Misora nodded. "Yeah, otherwise you'll miss the deadline for registering in the cosplay contest."

"Why would I enter any cosplay contest, I don't do cosplay! Ever!" Chisame growled at the annoying prankster who knew her secret. "Do I look like some no-life weirdo who goes around sewing up weird costumes and prancing around in them?"

"Excuse me? This is not 'weird', this was professionally tailored," the Joker said indignantly.

Negi twitched. "Yeah... Although it does feel like a bit of a waste, never getting to know WHO is kept here..."

"If Grandpa keeps it hidden, I'm sure he his good reasons! Which are good ones!" Konoka shrugged. "Not at all like how he kept Magic secret from me! You don't feel bad about every magical secret you don't have clearance for, do you, Negi-kun...?"

"No, of course not, but... Somehow, this one nags at me for some-"

"It's because that's your old man," Joker sang tauntingly.

"Shut up!" Negi snapped, in a way eerily reminiscent of Chisame's outbursts.

Konoka looked at Asuna and whispered to her, _"He'd have been better off with us."_

Asuna shrugged. "Maybe, but what's the point of wondering about that now?"

"What if we execute the kidnapper of the royal consort before leaving?" Lala proposed. "Outside, we might run into interference from the local law enforcement agencies, and I'd hate to be forced to enforce the superiority of my ranks over theirs, and-!"

Then the tube trembled violently, to such a degree none of the present could ignore it. This motion was accompanied by a low, rumbling sound that made Quartum finally look up from the floor with bright eyes and a slowly widening killer smile.

Madoka gulped. "Um, okay, I think it wasn't supposed to do that, RIGHT?!"

"Who cares, just to be sure, let's get the hell outta here already!" Misora panicked. "Seriously, at this point, _I'll_ join the cosplay contest if necessary! Happy Festival activities good! Dying underground bad, very bad!"

Negi, however, seemed to have frozen, his eyes growing rounder and vacant, his mouth taking a small 'O' form as his breathing became slower and softer. It was as if he was growing mesmerized, his eyes fixed on what there was ahead of him. He gave a short, shy step forward, making his Ministra and Rito wince in alarm.

"Um... Sensei?" Chisame was the first to ask.

"Negi-sensei, are you okay?" Ayaka asked, moving closer as well.

 _"Father,"_ Negi whispered, raising his eyes reverently as a series of spectacular images began forming again the eye of his mind.

Mordred sneezed.

* * *

Negi now stood on the edge of a large circular stone platform under a clear night sky full of huge, shining stars. He quickly recognized the signs of another vision, much like the one he'd fallen into while fighting the Heartless, and immediately assumed this was too much to be a random product of exhaustion; whatever or whoever was in that tomb was somehow reaching into his mind, but as soon as the idea bore fruit it was pushed back while Negi shuddered due to an extreme feeling of cold, only comparable to being hit by one of Evangeline's spells, or being told he had to make Makie top in the class.

Except nobody was attacking him yet. It was just his current (hallucinatory) surroundings were simply that cold. Negi looked ahead and saw a tall figure wrapped in a long cloak with his back to him, holding a long, easily recognizable bandaged staff in one hand. Forcing himself to consider things rationally again despite of his heart's desires, Negi reasoned this was just part of the induced vision and did not run towards this mysterious, hooded man who was so familiar. Still, if TV had taught him anything, facing his inner demons was likely necessary to wake up again, so he walked towards the stranger, calmly calling out to him, "Father? I know that's not you, not really, but-"

The man seemed to twitch in pain all of a sudden, doubling over and putting a hand to his face, and it was then that Negi got his first clear view of his features. They looked strikingly like those etched in his memories from that night of snow and fire, but there was also something different to them. At first he thought they reminded him of someone else instead, but he couldn't figure out who, until the mental image of Magus Erebus drifted slowly to him.

Negi flinched just as the man shook again, groaning under his breath. Two tall men and two slim young women then just walked through and past Negi as if he were a ghost, only stopping short behind the wheezing, shivering man. The largest of the men, a deeply tanned, blond haired individual, grinned as he placed a heavy hand on the broad yet slender shoulder of the tormented figure. "Yo, kid," he said, with a deep, gruff but also oddly playful voice that commanded further instant attention from Negi. "Just stop lazing around, willya? You know there's work to do."

The other male newcomer, someone else Negi had also seen in the pictures found in Kyoto, nodded sagely, his arms folded from the way the wide sleeves of his white robes seemed to connect. "Time waits for no man, not even for us. She's very unreasonable that way."

Negi trembled even more after looking at the two girls, whom he also recognized despite having aged a few years from how he knew them. "Stand steady, please, Negi-sensei," asked Miyazaki Nodoka sweetly. "We'll be right there with you. To catch you if you fall."

Her companion nodded. She was unmistakable despite the way her huge, black, conical pointy hat obscured most of her features. Perhaps it was the utility belt with juice bottles hanging from them that gave her away. "There shouldn't be much of a problem to finishing the operation as long as we stick to the plan to the letter. That includes you, Rakan-san..." she added, blandly lifting her quiet gaze over to the tanned giant, who simply chuckled.

"That can't be Yue-san, though," Negi squinted, clenching his teeth. "She would know better than to tempt fate like that, whatever that operation is..."

"That's a good observation, actually," said the same disembodied voice from the previous vision, now very clearly coming from behind him, irradiating a strong presence to such a degree Negi felt he literally couldn't turn around and face it. However, he didn't need to check to be sure that was a shapeless power swirling behind him, even if he still wished he could have. "If this happened to be just a fabrication, then I would need to adjust the script for next time."

"Why are you making me see this?" Negi asked, dreading to ask the other, most urgent question he desperately wanted to ask. "Do you hate me? Why do you torture me with this?"

"Why is it torture?" the voice answered with another question.

Negi sighed, looking at the five who stood watch over a distant blue planet, a gorgeous shining marble floating under them in the darkness of outer space. "That's me, isn't it?" he asked. "I could feel it almost immediately. Is this supposed to be a warning about my future?" he continued, noticing the strained marks on the other man's face when Nodoka tenderly caressed them with a hand. "Or is it misdirection, intended to stray me away from my path?"

"What is your path?" the voice only asked yet another question, for this apparently was no place for answers.

Negi tried to provide one of his own anyway. "You should know. My path has always been finding you."

"Ah. That might be a mistake, though. The dead are best left resting. The living should just keep moving forward with their own lives. Belonging to each other."

"You aren't dead, though!" Negi cried out, and for a moment he could have sworn the other Negi briefly blinked his way, perplexed, if he'd only been really looking at that Negi anymore by that point. "You can't be, this can't be just your ghost haunting me! Because you'd never be that cruel to me!"

"No," the voice said, distant and sad. "Not _me_."

"But _I_ would," the voice added next, managing to sound the same and still completely different, as only things in dreams can.

"And why would that be?" Negi asked, rubbing the tears off his eyes with a fist.

"The best lessons are always those learned through suffering," the voice cautioned, still sounding inhuman and aloof. "You can't understand yet, Negi, but I wish nothing but the best for you. That means I want to spare you any unnecessary suffering. That's why we saved you, five years ago. And yet. Suffering of the kind that strengthens the body and soul, that makes you a better person, that I would be eager to bestow upon you. Even when I don't want to."

"That man," Negi bitterly commented of his counterpart, "doesn't look very strong in body and soul to me."

"Oh, he is," the voice countered, "it's only that body and that soul aren't really his anymore."

Negi then tensed up in a primal, stark horror brought along by deductive reason. "And that... that happened to you as well?!"

The voice fell into silence, which is the most serious and worrying thing a voice can do. For then it effectively stops existing, and all answers die with it.

"Answer me, please!" Negi desperately begged. "What do I need to do?! What do you want me to do?! For you I'd do anything, you know that!"

Finally, it spoke again, oddly quoting Shakespeare of all things, in a tone that was so serious and grim it had to be mocking in its own style. _"I am thy father's spirit, doomed for a certain term to walk the night. And for the day confined to fast in fires 'till the foul crimes done in my days of nature are burnt and purged away. But that I am forbid to tell the secrets of my prison house, I could a tale unfold whose lightest word would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres, thy knotted and combinèd locks to part, and each particular hair to stand on end, like quills upon the fretful porpentine. But this eternal blazon must not be to ears of flesh and blood."_

"First Lewis Carroll, now this?" Negi hissed. "Go away, foul shadow! Impersonating my friends, my father's friends, or even my father himself won't help you! The more you speak, the more I grow convinced you are- you are- a charlatan!"

"You say that just because I don't hold to the idea you had formed in your mind about your father, don't you?" it questioned.

"Your actions don't match to the stories of anyone who ever knew my father, either," Negi gloomily replied.

"True, though you just haven't heard the right stories," the shapeless voice allowed. "Negi. While earlier I might have taunted you with Hamlet, I don't wish you to avenge me. Filling your heart with hatred wouldn't necessarily make you any stronger. At least, not the kind of strong a father- whether I'm that or not– wishes for his child."

"Then what do you do want?" Negi repeated, trying his best to be patient.

"I want you to forget about me, lest you end like this wrecked existence I'm showing to you. But, if you absolutely can't, then... you should kill me instead."

"Instead of what?"

"Of trying to save me, of course. I'm beyond saving now. I have done things-"

Negi tried to interrupt with something Haruna-san or others of his comrades would have said then, to brighten a mood that had become far too oppressive. Even though merely saying it was so difficult now. "What do you mean? Like reading Twil-"

 _"Don't,"_ the voice warned with chilling intensity, and Negi swallowed hard and nodded despite himself, even mumbling a quick apology. "You can't save me, no matter what, and much less without dooming yourself in the process. Please... just leave already. Your friends are wise in their own ways, listen to them. I should have listened more to mine. Even Nozomu-kun."

Negi sighed, gazing sadly at those abstract ghosts of Nodoka and Yue. "Why them? Why not Chisame?"

"You don't like them? I think Nodoka-chan fills that spacesuit quite nicely, and Yue-chan sure can rock the casual detective mage look..."

"You know that's not what I mean! What's the meaning of them being here above all others, if this is a fabrication of my mind, or yours?"

"I haven't said it is that, I just hinted at it. On the other hand, this might be an actual possible future, and in that case, things don't have to turn out just like you would have expected. Or hoped."

Negi shivered. "I just want to be back with her," he asked.

"You should," the voice agreed, and then Negi felt like briefly blanking out once more.

* * *

After taking what to those looking at him in the real world looked like only two steps, Negi stopped, blinking back as he apparently came back to his senses, much to his friends' relief.

"Soooo..." Yuuna said. "What happened?"

"I'm not sure," Negi said, his voice very muted.

"You had some sort of vision, right?" Chisame guessed.

"I think so," he admitted.

His primary partner sighed. "Just fight it, whatever that thing's telling you. I can tell it's messing with your mind, it doesn't take a genius to see the signs, but-"

"He's not telling me to free him," Negi mused, looking strangely at the containment unit. "At least, not in the way you probably think. Whoever he really is, he... would prefer to rest, and until we've figured his actual situation out, I'd say we... should respect his wishes. Let's regroup, fall back, and if there's a good reason why we should come back here... _**we will**_."

"Why do I have the impression the last part of that sentence is the only one that really matters to you?" Rito frowned.

"Oh, just like that?" Joker snickered. "No attempts to try and check it out yourself after coming all the way here? I'm delivering you what you've been looking for years, and you just reject _him_ like that? Not only a bad son, but a bad friend too..."

"I'm either a son respecting his father's wishes," Negi very seriously said, "or a Mahora employee refusing to unleash a being attempting to trick me and hurt my students. Either way, I'm doing the correct thing by calling your bluff out. Whatever my ultimate decision ends up being, it won't concern you anymore."

"Oh, guess I lost, then," the Clown Prince grimaced melodramatically, to such a degree the girls instantly felt wary of how easily he seemed to be giving up. "You've won the day, how could I hope to succeed, even when given the ultimate magical power in this world to unleash? Take me away, then, I literally can't keep on fighting...!"

"Puddin'...!" Sailor Uranus whined.

Quartum sneered venomously as Artoria roughly pulled him up, keeping him secured against herself. "Are we seriously just accepting this?! I had trusted you! You promised, even if we couldn't break her free, we could-!"

"If you really trusted me, you deserved everything that came to you, so nyah," the Joker flippantly told him before grinning at Temptress. "Good thing Tempy's smarter than that, aren't you, Tempy?"

The small Servant smiled and nodded, already vanishing away as she was recalled. Mordred and Artoria frowned at this, but made no real attempt to stop her. "It was worth a try after all, wasn't it? Good luck, Joker-san. It's been fun. Well, I lie. It sucked and I hope you die in a fire."

And then she was gone, and Haruka angrily roared at Mordred, "Why didn't you just attack her?! Had I known you'd do that, I'd have done it minecraf! You Servants are supposed to kill the other, evil Serv-!"

"We aren't supposed to interfere in other worlds' Wars more than necessary," Mordred sneered, "and that vermin wasn't worth my effort. Ask Father, if you will, why he spared her, when this is HIS war."

"If the Grail is truly cursed," Artoria grimly declared while Konoka healed Shirou, a frowning Setsuna overlooking the operations and Konoka's joy at it, "every Servant we slay will only feed its evil. We might yet need this Servant's assistance to finish this conflict, and in any case these children have suffered enough for a day. I did not wish to subject them to an execution unless needed."

"There," Mordred said with a nod. "Now you know."

"You realize that now that you let her live, you're Master's going to end up adding her to his harem, right?" Haruna said.

Mordred froze, before putting her hands on her head and letting out a skyward scream.

Lala pouted. "You're going to ask me not to enforce the execution my laws demand for now, aren't you?"

"Whose execution?" Joker curiously asked.

"Yours, of course!" Asuna growled at him.

"Ah. Well, if that's the case, then you absolutely shouldn't carry it out. The death penalty is cruel, outdated, a primitive vestige of dark ages, and highly inhuman," he piously declared.

"I'm not a human, though," Lala pointed out.

Yue sighed. "Just let it go, Lala-san. It's okay, he didn't even really hurt us. And frankly, I wouldn't look forward to being lectured by Batman-sama, so let's just let them settle it between themselves. Again."

"That sounds like a very sensitive and reasonable thing to suggest," Joker nodded, then told Yue, "I don't think I like you after all."

"Mutual," Yue snorted.

Lala hummed angrily. "Well, that was another unforgivable insult to the royal consort, but since she's seen fit to give you a decree of forgiveness, and we're getting late for the next few shows and exhibits, your life is spared! Ruffian!"

"Yaaaaay," Sailor Neptune said flatly. "If I testify to a few other offenses, will you change your mind?"

"I know when I'm licked, so take me away, book me, Dannos!" Joker extended his hands ahead, Haruna quickly slapping another pair of handcuffs on him. "O gray and sad day, the day the clown cried, I'm so miserable, poor little me... I can't help myself! I'm ill! I need proper help, tender care and kisses, not being suspected and profiled just because I've killed a few dozen times before!" He swooned, putting hand on his forehead. Haruna grabbed that hand, stuck another handcuff on it, snapped it back on to his other hand, eyed the fake hand still hanging from the handcuffs, gave him a flat look, a mercilessly drew out a roll of ductape.

"Okay," Chisame said, "you're definitely making this way too easy, so why don't you tell us what your real plan is..."

"Chisame, please," Negi sighed.

"Sensei!" the girl protested. "It's obvious this is a feint! You can see, can't you?! This is supposed to be a master manipulator with plans inside of plans and he's taking his capture like a game after calling us here in the first place! It's clear he's still playing us!"

"I know, Chisame," Negi said through gritted teeth, his gaze low. "But let's sort it away from here, okay? You said it yourself, we'd better leave at once. I... I don't think I can be here much longer..."

"Sensei," Ayaka softly said, easily catching him as he lightly wobbled forward, rattled and dazed. "This must be very taxing for you, after what you've gone through the whole day, right? Don't worry, I'll make sure you get the rest you need. You can always tell us exactly how you feel, once you think you can do it..."

"Thank you very much, Ayaka-san," Negi exhaled, supporting himself on her while the rest of his partners paused in concern. "I... I think I'd like that, actually."

"Oh my gosh," Sora whispered to herself, "he's actually accepting help and an offer of rest! He must be dying!"

"What poisons did you spray in the air, you bastard?" Asuna demanded, raising her sword threateningly.

"I'm not...!" Negi groaned while gesturing to lead the march out, the rest of the party leading their captives away, including a growling and still armless Quartum and a happily whistling Joker, who would at times even click his heels together. "Come on, we have to get back later, so Chachamaru-san can find those hidden explosives and we can deactivate them, assuming they really exist..."

Soon, the chamber was left alone once again. Silence reigned over it once more.

And then, now that it could not be heard, the tomb of the Mage of the Beginning trembled even more than before, with a loud, fierce crackle of imminent collapse.

* * *

 _The Haunted House:_

"I need to rethink my life," Ritsuka commented as they stood behind Nana, who was crouched down and picking up a small handful of dirt, leaning forward to whisper something at the tiny worms squirming through it. "It's taking me to places I never wanted to go."

"I'm sure everything will improve as soon as the need for fighting disappears and we settle down with a home of our own, Anchin-sama," Kiyohime replied, reaching over to pat him on an arm.

"Hush, you two," Professor Akashi growled, just barely beating Tamamo-no-Mae to the punch. "Well, what are they saying?"

"Give them time, they can't form and express complex thoughts and ideas. They don't even have brains!" Nana grumbled, then perked an ear up, nodding slowly. "I see, I see..."

"Okay, and how are they supposed to be talking back to you?" asked Blackbeard. "They don't have mouths either!"

"I'm just listening to the subtle sounds of their bodies grinding through the dirt, that's how they communicate," Nana explained, while the others looked at Momo in perplexity, and Momo only shrugged. "And they're saying they felt a very large worm drilling through the dirt, heading towards the Great Roots and now back, which is why they're drilling extra-hard now, too-"

"Do you mean they're getting back already?!" Akashi gasped. "Thank God if true!"

"I still think we could've been spared this scene, though," Ritsuka dryly observed, not even blinking as the ground under them trembled and growled, and Mashu and Kiyohime had to pull him back to safety a moment before Haruna's gigantic drill machine broke through the ground and surfaced, stopping with a loud puff of steam coming from its sides. "See? They're back already."

"Master, Master of the Obvious," Scathach stoically declared while a small window was opened from the inside of the House, and out popped Orihime's head, blinking her large and curious bright eyes.

"Is everything going fine here...?" she asked.

"Yeah, yeah, it is, don't worry and get back to the job, okay?!" Ichigo raised his voice, rolling his eyes around.

"Okey-dokey!" the girl peppily said before closing the window again.

"The mission's a complete success, guys!" Haruna said, climbing out the vehicle with a large grin, helping Nodoka out as she did. "The bad fellows are nabbed, the beautiful maidens are rescued, and-!"

"Is Yuuna okay?! Yuuna!" Akashi called out, making his way past the others and forcefully sticking his head inside of the driller. "Oh my God, why are you sitting next to THE JOKER?!"

"Do you think I'm happy with this?!" came his daughter's voice from the inside. "But it was either this or sitting next to the woman with toxic skin, it's not like there's a lot of room in here!"

"See, they all made it out alive," Mami very seriously told Illya. "Now please pay up."

Illya sighed, snapping her fingers while Sayoko pulled out a small purse and began stoically handing yen bills over to Mami, who proceeded to neatly fold them into her Victoria's Secret compartment. In her case, in her curls. "Fine, whatever, it's not like I really mind. At least it shows my family isn't full pf pushovers, like yours must have been..."

Right then a haunted-looking, pale Negi came out as well, supported by a suffering Shirou and an inconvenienced Chisame, with Ayaka dotting on him, and Illya frowned. "On the other hand, it looks like he might have survived, but not his spirit. Seriously, what happened to him?"

Negi spoke up with a heavy sigh. "Nothing. I just need a bit of rest and I'll be all right again."

Illya gasped, and even Berserker looked surprised. "He's actually admitting he needs to rest?-! You idiots! You were supposed to protect him! What did the clown do to him down there!-?"

Negi pouted. "Very funny, Illya. I'll have you know I'm not that bad."

"Yes," his Ministra, Saber, Shirou, Illya, Rito and Lala all chorused. "Yes, you are."

Negi heroically ignored them. "By the way, I might have found clues about Father's whereabouts, but... I wouldn't place too much faith in them."

"You did?!" gasped the Black Rose Baron as he rushed to him, all but shoving Chisame, Ayaka and Shirou aside to gently cradle the boy against himself. "I, I mean, that's not important right now! The only thing that matters is you, my, um, rival are okay! I couldn't stand losing you!"

Harley blinked as Karin roughly pulled her out, slamming her against the ground without a care. "Okay, who's that creep hitting on the li'l guy, and why are you mean to us while being friends to him? By the way, watch the hands, Butch! I'm an important doctor! I had my own TV show and everything!"

"Your talk show sucked, I watched the reruns!" Misa accused while helping Sakurako and Madoka out as well. "That was the biggest crime you've ever pulled off, if you ask me!"

"True," Harley admitted, looking really contrite for a second. "But I blame executive meddling! They said the raunchier the better! Dammit, Mistah Timm, I liked working with Mistah Dini better!"

"Mister Chamo!" Nana happily said, opening her arms while the ermine gleefully leaped into her tight embrace. "I was so worried about you!"

"Nana-neechan!" the small mammal cooed, rubbing his cheek against her chest. "I'm so happy to see you, too!"

"A talking animal, seriously, what a bunch of crock," Touko muttered as she walked out as well, dusting herself off and looking at all the other freaks gathered there with suspicion. "Oh my God, how many of you are there, anyway?! Is this some sort of cult?!"

"Yup!" Sakurako said happily.

"No," Chisame corrected flatly.

Mami blinked. "Is that... Excuse me, are you Fuukawa Touko-san?! The mystery writer?! Mother of Genocider Syo?!"

Ayaka flinched. "Tomoe-sempai? Don't tell me you're into sordid murder books! Not you! I'm willing to accept the librarians will read just anything regardless of quality, but you should-"

Mami wagged a finger with a small, cute pout in her pink lips. "No, no, no, no, Yukihiro-san. Accusing them of being cheap shock literature is doing a great disservice to these books! They are dense, tightly plotted psycho thrillers able of great human insight! Well, except for the Daring Do crossover, but-"

"I know, I know, I had that one ghost written because I couldn't get into the other franchise!" an exasperated Touko said through gritted teeth. "So, a fan, huh? At least you sound like you know what you're talking about. Yeah, I'll admit I didn't put my heart into that one, but can you blame me? That other franchise just vexes me! How could anyone like that?! I swear, from my initial e-mails with its original creator, I thought I was dealing with a horse that was somehow able to write!"

"I like those books, too," Yue monotoned. "They are quite imaginative, at least..."

"It can't be denied the series jumped the shark after the Amulet of Culiacan, however..." Nodoka sighed sadly.

* * *

Medea supposed it made perfect sense to lock the captives from Professor Negi's rescue raid for questioning. However, while she understood why Yuuna's friends would distrust her as well while they were at it in the context of a Grail War (and what apparently transpired beyond it as well) she thought they were sort of going overboard with it now.

"Medea of Colchis," Saber Artoria clenched her teeth coldly, pacing slowly around Caster, who stood at the middle of the large shed of the Mansion. The witch was standing in the middle of the room, leaning forward bent at the waist while her hands remained bound by an Itoshiki-lent rope that hung from the ceiling. All in all, it looked like the setup of a rape scene. "We know your secrets, we know of your ways, we know the effects of your Noble Phantasm, so don't even try escaping us and your judgment. Fate delivered you to us, so don't even think of cheating your way out, as Casters are prone to do!"

"What a classist, stereotypical accusation to lightly throw around!" the cheating witch said lifting her nose high. "Who is cheating here, Saber? Not only do you separate me from my Master while keeping yours by your side, but you choose to leave me restrained in this humiliating, borderline abusive fashion!" Her butt went 'wiggle, wiggle'.

Saber paused, briefly wondering if Caster didn't have a valid point somewhere in that tirade. "That... That is not cheating, that is merely a valid part of the strategies to hold captives of war... Besides, this somehow simply seemed like the correct thing to do to you! I have the strongest feeling you would do the same thing to me, or far worse!"

"I wouldn't, I'd be completely civil and gentle to you," Caster said. "Why, I'd even make sure to give you something very nice to wear..."

"Oh, I bet you would," Mordred dryly commented, sitting on a chair at the back of the room while eating Kira Potato Chips from a bag. "Seriously, what happened to that sweet empty-headed kid who cooked pancakes?"

"She might be right, Saber," Shirou argued. "This feels more like we're the bad guys! How can you say she's a prisoner of war when she gave up without a fight? And why bind her hands in the first place, she can just go intangible and free herself at any moment, this is not only wrong but dumb! That is, I'm untying her..."

"Don't you dare," his Saber said sternly. "Trust me, Shirou, this is the best way to deal with annoying spellcasters. I've had to deal with quite a few in my lifetime, this all comes from painful experience."

Mordred nodded. "For once you're right, Father. And this isn't even the worst of them! If I had the time, I'd tell you about that Shakespeare bastard, except because just thinking of him makes me feel sick..."

"Actually, thanks but no, that won't be necessary," Caster quickly said with a short shake of her head and a faint blush on her cheeks. Wiggle, wiggle. "In all honesty, I believe I'm beginning to enjoy this treatment, Master of Saber..."

"Why do you keep addressing him as my Master?" Saber frowned. "I haven't said he is yet."

"Oh please, why else would you keep such a plain, unremarkable, dumb looking person around your majestic, powerful and domineering figure?" Caster pointed out.

Saber paused again, impressed despite herself. "I will admit, for all the evil wiles of Casters, their insight and cleverness cannot be denied..."

Mordred shrugged. "You obviously haven't spent any time around Elizabeth Bathory, though..."

Shirou huffed. "I don't know, Saber, I'm starting to think maybe you were right on being harsh on her..."

* * *

"Maybe... I should handle a few of the sessions myself..." Negi said, trying to stand up from the bench in the backyard where Ayaka had just forced him to sit down with her. Now that they'd gotten him to admit he needed rest, they weren't going to let it go. Chachamaru stood guard nearby, vigilant nobody else would intrude to disturb her teacher's rest. "I can always rest after that..."

"Nonsense, Sensei," the beautiful blonde said, gentle yet firm as she pulled him back down, feeling him wobble against her and barely controlling herself. "Just look at your, you're spent! And you've still got a long day ahead of you, so you'd better take a nap while you can."

"B-But the Joker targeted me specifically, he'll want to talk to me, and anyway he's too dangerous, I-" he weakly insisted.

Chachamaru interrupted him as politely as she could. "Please, Sensei, heed to iinchou-san's advice. The others are contacting Batman-sama, he'll take care of that for you. In the meanwhile, your wellbeing is the most important thing for all of us."

"But, but it's about my father, and the Black Rose Baron will also want to-" Negi groaned, smacking together his lips sleepily.

Ayaka took another look at a nearby tree on the backyard, watched the foliage rustle awkwardly once more, and said, slightly strained now, "I'm sure the Baron will be available to resume his... feud against you as soon as necessary, Sensei."

"No, you see, I'm pretty sure he can't be my father now, so he must be... must be..." Negi yawned, then collapsed ahead, muttering, "I'm so sorry... Ayaka..."

And his head plopped down on her lap, his eyes closing.

"Iiiiii!" Ayaka shrieked, skin crawling up and growing fiercely scarlet.

"Iiiii!" the thing hidden in the tree agreed.

"That's much better," Chachamaru approved with a small nod. "I was starting to fear I'd have to bring the tranquilizer darts..."

"S-S-S-S-Sensei!" Ayaka gasped. "I, I honestly had no idea you felt this way about me...!"

Chachamaru dutifully played a voice sample recorded from Chisame. "Remember, keep your hands where the robot can see them. At all times!"

Ayaka scoffed. "Oh please, Karakuri-san! Don't be that way, obviously Hasegawa-san trusts me with Sensei's safety if she left him with me!"

Chachamaru ran another Chisame sound bite. "Remember, I'm doing this only because the other options are Kasuga, Kakizaki, Saotome-"

"I got iiiiiiiit!" Ayaka grinded her teeth together, gently placing a hand on Negi's head as she moved his body around into a more comfortable position under the watchful eyes of Chachamaru and The Thing In The Tree. She primly took the small white tissue Chachamaru was offering her now and delicately wiped the faint traces of red from her nose with it. "Thank you. Poor Sensei, I can't imagine how he must feel. All that happened to him today would break most grown men down..."

"... maybe should use Cassiopeia..." Negi mumbled in dreams. "That way, I could..."

"Shhh, shhhh," Ayaka warmly cooed, caressing his scalp and soothing him. "No more time travel for today, please? Just rest easy, I beg you..."

"Sorry..." Negi half-sobbed, mostly unaware, before finally falling into a deeper sleep.

Ayaka relaxed back and smiled, enjoying the heat of the sun while Chachamaru's shoulders blew convenient cooling air down on her and the teacher. She enjoyed the sight of the old manor house where Sayo's ancestors had once lived, and mostly enjoyed the small weight placed on her, tightening her legs together as his pillow. Definitely as his pillow and not because she was wet and horny or anything. Nope, totally not. "Life is good," she decided, in a very pleased tone of voice.

"It is worth fighting for," Chachamaru quietly agreed. They remained silent together for a long while after that, Ayaka shielding Negi's face from the worst of the sun with her hands and the shadow of her own body. Finally, the gynoid spoke again. "I'm worried about Mother," she confessed.

"Huh? What's wrong with Hak- Oh, right, you mean Chao-san. Sorry. Please don't let it bother you too much, I'm sure we'll talk her out of it. Chao-san's an intelligent and rational person, and surely she must see the folly of doing something like... that."

"Sorry to disturb you with my own family issues," the other girl apologized. "But I'm afraid you don't know Mother as well as I do. Once she puts her mind to something, there's nothing that will stop her."

"Don't apologize, I'm here to address the needs of all our students," Ayaka replied quickly. "You're never a bother! As for Chao-san, I'm convinced she really doesn't intend to do it. Otherwise, why wait until now? And why tell Sensei beforehand, instead of just taking us all by surprise? Perhaps this is nothing but a cry for attention."

"She's not that kind of person, I'm afraid," Karakuri disagreed respectfully. "And... I love her dearly, but it cannot be denied she is... complicated, sometimes. Other than that, I'm not sure how I should take the news that she claims to come from the future."

"What about it?" Ayaka blinked. "It doesn't change what she means to you, does it?"

"No, of course not. And I am a machine, and my best friends include space aliens, my counterpart from another dimension, and an ermine, so it's not that I resent her condition as an outsider either. Still, I can't help wondering... if she's a descendant of Sensei, does that mean I am one, as well?"

Ayaka blinked. "You think of Chamo-san as your friend? I, I mean! What's the matter if Sensei's related to you or not?!"

Chachamaru gave a brief, slightly uncomfortable look aside. "Nothing, I suppose. Although I am experiencing cognitive dissonance and nomenclature I address him as sensei, or grandfather?"

Ayaka frowned, the hand on Negi's head growing subtly clingier. "Chachamaru-san, I do believe you are as entitled to love, even love with human beings, as any of us, but if those designs include our teacher, then I must protest-"

"It'd be improper, I know," Chacahamaru nodded humbly. "Please forget I said anything. It never could be anyway."

Ayaka pondered that for a moment before relenting with a sigh. "Fine, I'll go easy on you this time. After all, I realize your feelings must be quite troubling at the time, just like Sensei's. God knows mine would be if I were involved in a situation with my relative from the future, in the middle of a chaotic juncture where time itself is apparently letting everyone in from any point of the past or-"

Then Chachamaru's sensors went wild, and she tried to scream a warning, just a second too late, as the next thing they knew, something had just dropped from the sky squarely on Ayaka's head.

* * *

Misora looked down from the rooftop. "Was that Iinchou yelling in pain?"

"I'm sure they'd have contacted us through the cards if they were having any trouble," Satomi obliviously replied, crouched by the small device shaped like a red phone she'd placed on the rooftop, and which buzzed slightly in a tone vaguely sounding like a Neal Hefti theme. "Odds are Chachamaru had to hit her after she went overboard with Sensei."

"Um, yeah, well," Asuna, who stood with both of them and Cocone on the rooftop of the Manor, scratched her cheek. "You sure that's going to summon Batman-sama here? Why not just to light up a giant bat-shaped signal?"

"Because it's still daytime, and because that's bound to bring more curious meddlers than Bat-clad vigilantes here?" Satomi answered with an exasperated sigh. "Pay better attention this time, Asuna-san. Like I mentioned before while you were seeing how far you could spit from up here, this soundwave projector will send signals across campus specifically aimed at the auditory range of bats..."

"Um, I hate to bring this up to an actual scientist, but Batman-sama is not, as a matter of fact, a bat himself," Asuna pointed out. "No bat powers either, unless he passed by the Oscorp exhibit on the way here and they had another unfortunate animal exhibit accident."

"I hear Daigoro-sensei is doing good work in the Antarctic as the Astouding Walrus-Man now," Misora said.

Hakase sighed. "I know! But he's still got several devices that operate in the same frequency as the Chiropteran auditory system, allowing him to summon bats as living weapons! That is a well-documented fact from his public exploits, so these waves I'm sending should, while repelling any actual bats from here, also trigger his own devices, which he will no doubt use to track our current location and-"

"You can turn it off. NOW," the Batman growled, standing behind Satomi all of a sudden while Asuna and Misora pulled back in surprise.

"Man!" Asuna gasped. "Even better than Tsunetsuki-sempai, indeed!"

Satomi smiled and nodded, turning the phone-shaped device off. "I knew I could count on the ingenuity of a fellow inventor. Because you were the one to design your Bat-devices, weren't you?"

"Well, actually, he had a little help there," said another voice, which made Asuna turn around and then swoon at the sight of a handsome young man in a colorful, dashing costume with long, flowing cape and a lean, athletic build, no doubt in his college years already, which was still old enough for Asuna to accept if the man was pretty enough. Which this one was, that much was obvious despite his mask, which wasn't exactly covering much of his face anyway... "Good afternoon!" he grinned at the girls, making Asuna take a step back and swallow, visibly impressed. She'd always expected for the Batman's partner to be a little munchkin dressed like some sort of camp gay elf, but this... "Batman mentioned he'd brought us along this time around, didn't he?"

"Uh, urh, well, he, he... Us?" Asuna said, before looking aside and seeing a rather serious looking young woman, barely taller with herself, in a mostly black tight bat costume, long red hair sticking out the back of her cowl. "Oh, I see, right..."

"I did," Batman said gravelly. "Robin, Batgirl, these are Kagurazaka Asuna, Hakase Satomi, Cocone Fatima Rosa and Kasuga Misora, four of Springfield's oldest associates. Who, I assume, had good reasons to call us here while we were looking for the Scarecrow..."

"Actually, yes, we have the Joker, Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy down there," Cocone quietly said, receiving wide eyed, silent looks from the three Gotham vigilantes fractions of seconds later.

Cocone only nodded a confirmation, as stoic as ever.

"Oh my God," Batgirl gasped, growing slightly agitated. "How many of you did he, did they-"

"We're all okay, other than a few scratches and bruises Haruna-san got," Cocone flatly said. "But Konoka-san already healed her. Besides... it was just Haruna-san."

Robin and Batgirl's eyebrows twitched while the Batman only hummed deeply to himself.

"We're going to be offered these guys' jobs next, aren't we?" Asuna hopefully asked Hakase.

The scientist frowned. "I bet you would love that, wouldn't you...?"

* * *

 **Mini Interlude: The Best Revenge is Best Served in Cosplay.**

"Good afternoon!" the young woman with glasses smiled warmly at the boy behind the counter. "I'd like to register for the cosplay contest, please! My name's Hasegawa Chisame!"

"You're evil," flatly whispered the tiny, frail looking Albino in the light orange summer dress standing by the taller girl while the attendant turned around to enter her register data into the computer. "And taking risks like this, just after almost being caught, and all for nothing..."

"No, it's hardly nothing," Temptress said, keeping her prana focused as to maintain the illusion of her older body. With Quinn and Isley now gone, soon she'd need looking into alternatives to recharge herself, but she'd already thought of a few possibilities. Ruri would be her absolute last resource, however, like a dog kept as an emergency food supply. "This is something I... I mean, _she_ is got to do, and it's obvious she won't do it on her own, so I'm just giving her a little push..."

But mostly, it'd be a chance to see her squirm and suffer by the time she was done with her. And Temptress knew better than anyone, that couldn't happen to a better person.

* * *

 _Back behind Casa de Spooky:_

"... Interesting," Chachamaru said, keeping her rocket punch trained on the little girl who had just dropped out of nowhere on Ayaka, resulting in a mutual knockout. And much like Ayaka herself, this girl had long, light blond hair and fair skin, even if this one's hairstyle included twin tails kept together by red bows. Other than this, she was wearing a black bikini that was far too skimpy for someone of her apparent age– not that this really bothered Chachamaru, who had worked for Evangeline since she could first remember– and her feet were bare. "Are you alive?"

Ayaka groaned, sitting back up to consciousness and rubbing the brand new lump on her head while Negi still napped on her lap. "Y-Yes, of course, not that a simple block of cement could hurt Yukihi- No, wait, what's that, that's no block of cement!" she freaked out, pointing at the girl Chachamaru had actually been addressing before.

Suddenly, this person jumped back acrobatically and pirouetted into a crouching fighting position, blue eyes sparkling. Then this instinctive reaction of battle readiness briefly lapsed as her orbs grew wider and even brighter, fixed on Chachamaru as the little girl, barely older than Negi, gasped, "It's you! So it has worked, after all!"

Negi grunted in his sleep, turned around, and tried to hide his face in the stomach of the downright shocked Ayaka. "Oh my God..." the heiress said quietly. "I knew this'd happen someday, I knew Father had to mess up like this at some-"

The girl stood straighter, bowing deeply, with a grandiose flair and a no less exaggerated high pitched declaration of intentions. "It is a pleasure to meet you all! I am Yukihiro Mizore!"

Ayaka grunted darkly. "... Fabiola-san was right after all, and Roberta-san trusted him too much, that's got to be a first..."

"Maybe she's just some pretender," Chachamaru tried to comfort her classmate. "I'm sure this kind of attempt to stake a claim on your fortune has been attempted before?"

"Eh?" the little girl blinked. "That's so mean of you! Chachamaru-san! Haven't you always been accepting of others, willing to believe them innocent until proven otherwise, especially as long as they were a cute loli with blonde hair who reminded you of you first?"

"If she's another fake, she's certainly done her homework concerning my classmates," Ayaka noted, "and at the very least, this one's not wearing a wig or dyeing her hair, that's pure Yukihiro Hair of Gold (TM) there. They must be learning after the last dozen trumped-up lawsuits, about time..."

The Yukihiro Hair of Gold is a registered trademark of Yukihiro Innovations, all rights globally reserved.

The girl dressed too scantily for her age blinked several times, scandalized. "What is that?! I'm a genuine part of the Yukihiro Family! If you would just let me explain...!"

Negi turned around again, nuzzling his cheek against Ayaka's legs for a moment before sleepily muttering a soft "Sister..."

The nearby tree exhaled a sigh of contentment.

The Mizore girl briefly looked up at said tree. "Did that thing just sighed, really? A-Anyway, that doesn't matter now!" She pointed a finger at Ayaka the way a famous over-dramatic lawyer in a videogame would. "You, Yukihiro Ayaka! Step away from that man, right now!"

Ayaka frowned sourly. "What in the world are you saying, you little madwoman?"

"That's Negi Springfield, isn't he?" Mizore eagerly accused. "Part of a family of lady-killers who have made, and will make, a lot of women cry! Including you! An enemy to all females and some males! No, an enemy to all humanity! A sexy muthafucka! A harbinger of our doom!"

"Okay, she's obviously talked to Chisame-san before this, too," Chachamaru observed.

"Either her or Kotegawa-sempai," Ayaka grumbled. "Honestly, that woman..."

"I'm serious!" the little girl yelped at her. "Come with me if you want to live! I know what I'm talking about! Just ask any of the others, if they're already here!"

Ayaka sighed deeply, gently setting Negi's head down on the bench as she stood up, facing the newcomer with a stern scowl. Chachamaru respectfully stepped aside, and the treetop briefly sounded as if someone had just ripped a bag of popcorn open. "Very well, young lady," the rich teenager said, "if you want to be heard by the English Research Society, you will have to show some respect for our leader, Negi-sensei, first! Otherwise, I will have to discipline all unruly, troublemaking children who dare disturbing his rest and insult him after a long day of work!"

The little girl cutely frowned, falling back into a stance that Ayaka, to her surprise, recognized as a staple of the Yukihiro martial arts style. "I see," she said. "So I'll have to prove myself to you, that's fine." She smiled. "I didn't expect any less from you, so I'll make sure you're left a proud Grandma!"

"A what?!" Ayaka cried at this brat's insolence before said brat, in an impressive burst of speed, shot ahead and swung an arm for Ayaka's stomach. The taller blonde, instinctively, reacted by successfully blocking the attack with her forearm, but had to wince at how strong that punch had just felt. Whoever this was, she truly was well trained!

"Well done!" Mizore congratulated her with a small cocky grin. "You might have something new to teach me today, after all!"

"Oh, I'm sure I'll think of something!" Ayaka growled, also blocking her next strike, an attempted upward blow aiming for her chin, with both fists. "I only hope you're a better student that some just as rude gorillas I know!"

"Is Asuna-nana here, too?" a now genuinely schocked Mizore paused before Ayaka pushed her back with a dual-handed upward thrust, trying to subdue her without hurting her... too much, at least. The child took this with a short grunt, but refused to fall even as she stumbled back, quickly regaining her balance. "I mean what I say, just give me a chance, okay?! If Asuna-nana's still with you, then there may be a chance yet!"

"A chance of what, may I ask?" Chachamaru asked, reaching over to hold the angrily fuming Ayaka back by grabbing her arm.

Mizore pouted. "Well... I guess I'm the worst person to tell you about this, since I don't know much on the subject either, but... I come from-"

"A parallel dimension?" Chachamaru asked.

"The future?" Ayaka growled bitterly.

Mizore blinked again, helplessly. "Ah... has something like this actually happened to you already?"

"Just say which one!" Ayaka hissed, clearly out of patience.

"... the future," Mizore said, sounding meek and overwhelmed all of a sudden.

Ayaka looked at Chachamaru, who only shrugged vaguely. "I suppose I should have imagined she'd have directly asked about Erebus-sensei or Fujimaru-sempai if she had been from another dimension. My apologies."

Mizore cringed despite herself. "What happened to you two? No, wait, what _will_ happen to you two? At least it will be a change for the best, I guess..."

* * *

 _Within the House:_

"So, um," Yuuna coughed as the two of them stood by the door to the room where the Sailor Senshi were gathered, "I'm sorry we had to call you away from your day with Aino-san's friends."

"Huh? Oh, no, that's okay, they are kinda boring, actually!" Makie waved off Yuuna's concern with a smile. "I'd rather be with you guys anyway, and I know Akira-chan feels the same! So, I heard a bit about your dad, do you wanna talk about it?"

"Not right now, sorry," Yuuna grouched.

Makie paused. "All the same, I feel I have to tell you... at first, it's always hard getting used to a new parent, but... you get used to it eventually, it's not that big a deal..."

"Your dad remarried a pianist and your mom remarried a successful office lady who just happens to like the shooting range a bit too much. Dad literally went and got himself a literal murderous witch. No offense, Maki-chan, but I don't think our situations compare at all," Yuuna grumbled.

Makie sighed and threw up her hands. "Fine. What do I know about any having a step-parent, I only have two of them. That doesn't make me an expert or anything, right? Sooooo... do you think that's going to work out?" she asked, poking a thumb back towards the door they were supposed to be watching.

Yuuna shrugged. "Those women are real witches too, so I doubt it, but who knows? Akira-chan is always saying those are supposed to be good powers, so they probably wouldn't have them in the first place if there wasn't any good in them..."

* * *

"I don't think you've quite grasped it yet," Artemis sighed while pacing back and forth across the table between the two evil Senshi sitting on one side and the two good Senshi (and Shiho) standing at the other. "Your powers are a blessing from the Silver Millennium, mankind's most glorious age, a time of unmatched prosperity and general goodwill among all men, women, robots, aliens, plants, demons, angels, gods, goddesses, vampires, werewolves and fairies. Just having them means your past incarnations during that period must have been part of the court of Queen Serenity. So it makes no sense you'd use those gifts for crime and self-serving purposes now!" he finally shouted, stopping altogether to stare angrily at the two unfazed Outer Senshi.

Was this how Luna felt during crises? No wonder she'd always been on edge back then!

"Questiooooooon," Sailor Uranus raised a hand. "If that Silver Whatchacallit was so great and awesome, why did it end in the first place? It must have sucked after all if it collapsed!"

"What's so bad about using one's powers for whatever one considers right?" Neptune shrugged indolently. "I don't remember agreeing to help you stupid children before we could have these powers in the first place. And I don't take orders from cats, period. You got the wrong Gotham lawbreaker here, meatbag."

Artemis ran a paw down his face. "You really have no memories at all from those times, do you? Not even lingering dreams from magnificent previous lives? A feeling of emptiness at the injustices of life and the plight of your fellow man?"

"I often feel empty when I witness ills being brought upon men, but only when someone has beaten me to it," Neptune answered. "Does that count?"

"I dream a lot of really weird crap, you'll have to be more specific," Uranus added. "But I won't feel comfortable sharing most of it in front of these kids..."

Sailor Mars sighed miserably. "This isn't getting us anywhere. Are you sure there's no way of taking their powers away and give them to anyone else? Seriously, at this point I'd even take Saotome over them...!"

"It doesn't work like that, you're either born with the correct Star Seed or not!" Artemis said. "It's not something you can happily trade around!"

"Why are you so interested in having us joining your little gang anyway?" groaned Uranus, folding her arms on the table and then resting her chin on them like a spoiled child. "Looks like you got along without us before, so what's the matter? Let's all just agree to keep our business separate, oceans apart, you don't cross us, we won't mess around with your little Save the World Junior Brigade..."

"I wish we could do just that, too," Artemis growled, gesturing with his fore paws for emphasis, "but it's not that simple! To unleash the ultimate power of the Moon Princess and restore peace to the planet, all of the Solar System Senshi will be needed!"

Sailor Venus facepalmed. "Oh my God, Artemis, if I'd known you'd be such an awful negotiator I'd have kept you outta the room. Look at your, you're downright begging! You've got to play hardball! Listen, you hussies, you're right in that we really don't need you, so it's only in YOUR best interests to play nice or else-!"

"Or else what?" Neptune, the experienced murderous Gotham criminal, said softly in the way only someone who's killed more than most new diseases.

"Don't fight, don't fight..." Sailor Mercury mumbled, aware they were pissing off an experienced Gotham criminal who had killed many, many people ever before she got her magic powers.

"We don't have the time to play these kinds of games, Venus, they need to understand the seriousness of the situation quickly!" the Mau told his owner. "If the enemy conquers Earth, they'll suffer, too! Why, they'll be some of the first targets, being that they own those Star Seeds in the first place!"

Uranus blinked. "Wait. Maybe you should've started by saying that?"

"Don't listen, Harley, they're just trying to fool you," Isley sighed. "Which admittedly doesn't take a lot, but I hope you'll at least prove to be smarter than a cat..."

"Cats don't fall in love with the Joker, so I'm afraid your friend already lost in that battle of wits," Shiho said.

Ivy shrugged. "Point taken, I guess."

"HEY...!" Harley growled.

Artemis exhaled loudly. "Okay, I guess you leave me with no choice but to tell you about the true story behind our enemy, the Dark Kingdom, and hope you aren't Stupid Evil enough to try and join them. No way they wouldn't end up backstabbing you, no matter what..."

"Will this be a repeat of the story Kuro-san told back in Kyoto?" Akira wondered aloud. "If so, could I please go out for some water in the meanwhile...?"

* * *

 **Interlude: The Last Servant**.

 _Meanwhile, in another room of the house:_

Ritsuka blinked, highly concerned, as he looked at the large fists of the Servant he'd just summoned back to his side after a Command Seal had finally been restored.

"Something wrong, Master?" Beowulf smiled.

"Why are your knuckles stained red?" Ritsuka finally asked. "More than usual, I mean?"

"Oh, that!" the taller man laughed without concern. "You see, they're having a fighting tournament in this place! First thing I did as soon as I learned was register myself, naturally! If our enemies are any worth fighting at all they'll be there too! And of course, I've had to start fighting my way through the preliminaries!"

"Um, no," Scathach said. "I saw the fliers and posters for that, and I clearly read those preliminaries wouldn't be starting until tonight."

The manly Berserker shrugged. "'Preliminaries' can be a relative term, you know? Let's just say I and some other guys who also registered couldn't wait that long to start, and they were being idiots who needed to be put in their place, so...!" Again, he shrugged, then looked all around. "So what do you have to eat around here, Master? I'm starving! I didn't have any time to eat out there while kicking so many people around...!"

Ritsuka sighed miserably. "Kiyohime, please, show him the way to the kitchen..."

* * *

 _Elsewhere in the Festival:_

Ako blinked in concern at the suddenly full infirmary she had before herself.

"He was a devil...! The Lord of darkness himself incarnate...!" Gōtokuji Kaoru moaned from his bed, clearly traumatized and badly pummeled. "The Day of Judgment is upon us...!"

"Like hell, he just got a lucky shot on me...!" mumbled Hibiki Dan from the next bed, an eye hideously swollen and cheeks horribly mishapen, large prints of knuckles all over them. "Next time I'm licking him down for sure, I'm wise to him by- OW OW OW, IMOUTO-CHAN, MORE PAINKILLERS PLEASE...! I haven't felt this bad since I fought that girl who looked like a Squirrel…"

"I wasn't even challenging anyone...!" one Urashima Keitaro whined from a third bed, all bandaged up like a mummy. "I just wanted to mediate...!"

The beautiful young woman with long black hair sitting by his bedside sighed. "I'm thankful you tried to defend my honor, Sempai, but honestly, I could do that on my own...!"

"Well, who cares anyway?" asked Naru, standing by her side with her arms folded. "He's okay now! I mean, he was comatose only half a hour ago and now look at him! Another hour, and he'll be jumping all over the festival again...!"

* * *

 _Back at the Haunted House:_

"Okay," Akashi-sensei grunted while pushing open the door of Caster's interrogation room, "I really hope you've finished by now, as this has taken too... too..."

Artoria blandly looked at him from where she stood before Medea's highly restrained form. "You should have knocked first," she dryly told him.

Akashi bristled madly for a second before thundering at Shirou, "EMIYA!"

"I'm sorry, Sensei!" Shirou slapped his hands together and bowed deeply. "I know she's my Servant, and I should have more control over her, but her arguments were convincing...!"

"Oh, I bet they were!" the teacher said, storming past Artoria as she stepped aside without any expression, then starting to undo the knots around his Servant's wrists. "Fine, this is it, I'm taking my Servant and my wife away and going back to my post, and then we'll have a very long and serious talk about this tonight...!"

"Thank you so very much, Master..." Medea sighed sweetly at her knight in shining armor, conveniently forgetting to tell him she could slip free of her bonds at any time, something he already knew but had forgotten in the midst of his anger. "Soon I'd have cracked under this brutish interrogation...!"

He gently grabbed her hands, studying them closely. "Are you hurt? Do you need prana? If there's something I can do for you..."

"Ooooo-oooohh, well, I think there's a room at the end of the hall where we could..." she started.

"Hey, what the heck, no!" Shirou protested. "I'm semi-honorary Ala Alba, I'm not letting you turn Negi-sensei's attraction into a love hotel, teacher or not! Please think of what you're doing!"

The others stared at him in utter shock. "What?!" Shirou scoffed. "I mean it! I respect you, Sensei, but you still shouldn't-!"

"How," Mordred asked the thing in everyone's minds, "do you even know about love hotels?"

Shirou blinked. "Why shouldn't I? I collect newspaper clips on police raids and arrests, half of those happen in love hotels!"

"You are weird," Mordred cringed.

Shirou smiled proudly. "It's all part of the preparation for a superheroic life!"

"Yes, you _are_ weird," Akashi agreed with the Knight of Treachery.

"Hey, you're a law enforcer yourself!" Shirou reminded him.

The older man nodded. "Exactly, and we don't look kindly at vigilante justice. Even your father regretted that course of action eventually, I thought you had learned from him and-"

Shirou sighed. "Look, please, as you said yourself, we can discuss that tonight. But if you want to, um, take things to rooms with Caster-san, then please do it elsewhere..."

"She should still be a prisoner," Artoria scowled.

"That's fine, there's still a prana sharing, link-reinforcing activity we can perform while in this very same room," Medea smiled. "It would greatly help us develop our relationship, and it'd be a valuable tool for surviving these times of turmoil..."

Akashi frowned. "Caster, I know what you're talking about, and we've discussed this before, I'd love to, but I'm not sure we're ready yet to..."

"But they've done it!" Medea pouted, pointing at Shirou and his Saber.

Akashi stared wildly at Emiya again. "You have a Pactio with your Servant!?"

Shirou sighed easily. "Oh, that's what you mean, right? I was growing worried you meant something... weird. Yeah, we do, it's hard to explain..."

"No, it's very easy to explain. He's such a crappy Master he needed the extra link to hold Father's reigns half-decently," Mordred expanded.

"The same could be said about your Master!" Shirou snapped defensively.

"No, Master is much better than you, we only took the plunge because our bond is much deeper than yours to begin with..." she smiled evilly at him.

Akashi blinked, concerned. "Are those provisional or permanent alliances?"

Mordred pointed at Shirou. "Does this look like a guy who has sealed a permanent deal already?"

"He isn't," Artoria agreed, "and neither is your Master."

"Well, let's see who gets there first, then!" Mordred hissed, upset at being reminded that.

"From the sound of things, probably that Astolfo person," Shirou said.

"LIKE HELL! I CAN GROW A PENIS TOO, IT'S EASY, FATHER WAS ABLE TO DO IT!" Mordred roared.

"Yes, you do that," Medea nodded while lightly crouching down to start drawing with chalk kept on her person all across the floor. "In the meanwhile, Master, please do understand desperate times call for desperate measures, and it is time you got over your first wife's death already..."

"But it's hard...!" Akashi winced while sniffing slightly.

"There, there, Dad always felt the same way..." Shirou sympathetically patted his shoulder. "Wait a second, though, you know how to do THAT kind of magic too?!"

Medea gave him an annoyed stare. "This is just an elementary variation on much better magical procedures we had during the Era of Gods! Why shouldn't I know about it? This is something I could do even while asleep!"

"Good, then if you hang around these people long enough, they won't need the annoying white rat anymore," Mordred nodded while Caster rose from the glowing circle on the floor, this time including varied Greek symbols rather than runes.

"Why does everyone hate the poor guy so much?" Shirou wondered. "Seriously, other than Sensei, Karakuri-san, Nana-san and me, is there anyone who likes him at all?"

Medead stared Rule Breakers at him. "You just be quiet and make sure to take a picture of it, will you?"

"Hai, hai..." Emiya sighed, obediently pulling his cellphone out.

"Caster, please," Wataru rasped through his dry throat. "I'm well aware of the, complications of our situation, and I swore to do everything in my power to keep you alive, but maybe right now isn't the best time-"

"You should have used another Command Spell now," she huskily told him, throwing her arms around his neck and further cutting the flow of his words with her violent, torrid and forceful kiss.

The ensuing glow was really great and impressive this time, Shirou had to admit that, as he was nearly bowed back by the force of the magical outburst happening so close to him. It was fairly bigger than the flash that had ensued when he had given Saber their Pactio kiss, and it took the student far longer to regain his sight this time around, forcing him to rub his eyes several times and to seriously worry about being left blind for a moment. Thankfully, he could see again shortly afterwards.

The first thing he could see afterwards was Caster again, once more flashing that smug smirk of hers while holding up her own, fresh Pactio card.

It showed Caster in her usual purple getup, her face once again concealed by her ominous cloak, standing in an austere, quiet pose with her hands folded before her lap. Under the image the ever helpful Spirits of Magic had branded the CASTER designation in big type, and under that, in smaller print, the name _Medea Colchora_ and a Latin title.

 _Magus Ab Aetate Deorum_

"Magus from the Age of Gods," Medea proudly translated, despite the fact nobody had asked her to.

"C-Caster...!" an oddly blushing Akashi-sensei stuttered, blocking his mouth with a hand.

"Well, whoopie-de-doo," Mordred flatly non-cheered. "I'm so glad for you, Caster, I only hope this unholy marriage goes better than that of another pointy eared sneaky bitch with a holier-than-thou man in a position of-"

Yuuna then barged in, crying desperately. "Dad! Dad, are you okay?! We saw that flash of light coming from here all the way at our post, and I thought-!"

Caster chuckled. "Ufufufu."

Her Master gave her a quietly nervous sideglare. "Please, don't..."

"Yuuna-chan!" Caster merrily skipped ahead, all sunshine and happiness, while Yuuna instinctively frowned and backed away. Shirou began quietly slipping for the door behind her, holding Artoria's hand. "My dear daughter, do we have something to show you! Your father and I have a very pleasant surprise for you, our beloved...!"

* * *

The Joker looked up from his table after hearing that blood curling scream that had just rattled the whole house, followed by gunfire. "Oh my God," he said, "what are you monsters DOING to that poor girl?! And can I get pictures?"

* * *

 **To be Continued**.

* * *

 **My Knights**.

"You are to be," Artoria solemnly exclaimed, placing an armored glove on her chest, "my new Knights of the Round Table!"

Shirou looked down at his dinner table again. "Ah, so that's why you sawed it into this shape..." That had been good wood too.

Artoria nodded energetically. "That's why I summoned you all here today! You are now Sir Shirou! Sir Negi! Sir Asuna! Sir Setsuna! Sir Kotaro! Sir Black Rose Baron! Sir Ritsuka! And last but in no way least, Sir Galahad, of course!"

Mashu blinked. "Um, but what about Mordred-san...?"

"What about him?" her king asked, somewhat coldly all of a sudden.

"Won't she, you know, be kind of offended about being left out?" Asuna asked.

"He should have thought of that before betraying the kingdom," Saber said. "Why should I be stupid enough to commit the same mistake twice? This era must be saved, but that cannot be done with traitors in our midst!"

"Haven't you considered," Ritsuka pointed out, "maybe the mistake back then was not showing Mordred she was loved for what she was? Just doing your thing and leaving her to draw her own conclusions on her own? Aren't you actually just repeating that mistake, or worse, by leaving her out altogether this time?"

Artoria looked at him blandly. "You lost me," she confessed.

"Hello, Mom?" Kotaro grinned as he made a cellphone call. "It's me, and guess what? I'm a knight now...! Way cool, huh? Aw, of course there's going to be fighting, otherwise what's the point? Don't be a spoilsport, I've gotta join this fight for my new boss! See, now his son's gonna be trying to kill him over leaving him outta our Club of Knights, so I can't leave my boss like that, after he was nice enough as to ask me for his help. Beside's, he's a girl too, so that's another reason why I have to defend him. No, Mom, you're getting it all wrong, he's not that kind of guy, he just happens to be a girl like his son, sheesh!"

* * *

 **The Forbidden Room**.

"That," Artoria sternly told her son as she pointed towards that door, "is Shirou's most private, personal room. We'd both be thankful if you never entered it in any way, shape or form..."

"Like I'd care about any secrets that geek's keeping," Mordred snorted.

"Be nice to your stepmother or he'll stop cooking for you," Artoria chided.

"… fine."

* * *

"You have to keep finding new and growing ways to betray my trust, don't you?" Artoria asked rhetorically as she seemed to appear out of nowhere behind Mordred later that night, despite lacking a Spirit Form. The younger, Daisy Dukes-and-tube top Servant yelped in surprise and turned around.

"N-No, of course I wouldn't- care enough about any of this to come here willingly! I just got lost on my way to the bathroom, that's all! Japanese houses have confusing layouts!"

Artoria frowned at her, picking the sheet from the floor and placing it back on top of the row of colorful costumes on mannequins. "Shirou's dream has always been to be a superhero. Why wouldn't he try to prepare himself for it?"

Mordred blinked. "You mean he really puts on those ridiculous things and goes off to stalk the nights like a Vigilante?"

Artoria shook her head. "Not yet, because he thinks he's not ready and this isn't 'Path of the King'. These are only discarded prototypes he's made himself over the years."

"Even that leather jacket and leather pants combo with all the chains?"

"Apparently that was once fashionable among heroes of this century," said the woman who made her face and hairstyle really popular.

Mordred winced in disgust. "Why doesn't he just throw them away? They're all awful!"

"They're still something he's invested a lot of time and loving effort into, and it's hard for him to let go," Artoria mused. "Besides, he says he might find a sidekick..."

"Ah, right," Mordred nodded sagely, "the sidekick always has to wear something more ridiculous than the hero, unlesss his name is Kato..."

"I'm teaching him to ride the Shirou-cycle right now," Artoria pointed at a shiny black V-Max in a corner of the huge room. "He's got the makings of a fine driver, I'm sure he'll be ready soon enough, just in time for his license..."

Mordred sweatdropped. "Shouldn't you keep that thing in a garage?"

"These are some gadgets he's considered for his mission," the older Saber went on, showing her off the shelves lined up with dozens of small artifacts. "Darts, grappling guns, throwing bolas, lassoes, he even made his own formula of stun gas..."

"Nice to see he's got so much faith in his magic skills to keep him alive," Mordred sneered. "Seriously, though, why not just pack guns?"

"Shirou respects all human life, there are lines he simply would never cross," Artoria said solemnly. "Also, guns are currently unfashionable after some clown made a man called the Punisher literally eat all of his."

 _Somewhere else, Archer sneezed_.

Mordred chuckled. "Well, I suppose I'm toast right now, correct? I'm the typical nosy meddler who learns the hero's secret identity, so I guess you'll kill me now, won't you?" she sarcastically asked her father. "I heard that's the fashion this century too."

Artoria stared blandly at her before motioning at her to leave the room already.

"I was serious about the guns, by the way," Mordred said, arms folded behind her neck, as Artoria carefully locked the door again from the outside. "I used to know this guy who was really good with guns, and that kept him well alive for a long time..."

"I am glad," Artoria dryly said, "your experiences with gunslingers have been better than mine. So, what kind of outfit more ridiculous than his did he make you wear?"

Mordred scowled. "I hope you end up wearing the abomination on the fifth mannequin, Father!"

* * *

 **Where?**

"Then, where is Chaldea located, anyway?" Negi asked. "We might have to see if there's one in this world, too."

"We don't know," Mashu replied.

"You don't even know where do you live?!" Chisame cried out.

"Well," Ritsuka offered, "Mashu spent all of her life within those walls, so it's not like she ever got to walk out and see where she was. And those guys were really secretive, you should have been there when they took me and Sis there..."

* * *

"So... where are we going?" Ritsuka asked.

"Isn't this the kind of thing we should've asked **before** boarding the plane?" his sister wondered aloud.

"Chaldea," the ever grim agent sitting before them during the flight answered.

"And... where's that, exactly?" Ritsuko added.

"..." the agent said.

"...?" went the siblings.

"Look, you can get there in this plane, or walk after we throw you out with a parachute. And I mean _one_ for the both of you. If the former, you won't need any directions. If the later, you will. So, which will it be?"

"Um... so, which movies do they show in this trip?" Ritsuka asked.

"It's a place with an active night life, isn't it?" Ritsuko doubted. "Oh, who am I kidding, we're in a death trap set for Nowhereville, aren't we?"

"We always can throw you out _without_ the parachute if you're going to be so negative about the whole thing," the agent offered.

Ritsuko sighed, leaned back on her seat, and pulled a small pillow over her eyes. "Just wake me up when we get there, please."

* * *

"The only thing we know for sure is it's on a mountain pass covered by snow and ice everywhere, and that it stands on ground not owned by any single country, Sensei," Mashu said respectfully after that not so helpful explanation.

"Ah, I see," Negi said. "Antarctica, then."

 _"ANTARCTICA?!"_ Chisame and Ritsuka gasped at once.

Negi blinked. "Well, with that kind of specifications, it couldn't be anywhere else, could it? Pretty much every other chunk of continental mass on the planet, and any islands large enough as to hold such a huge base, belong to one nation or another. It has to be Antarctica, and only because no one recognizes the Savage Lands as a country!"

"No, no, that's just plain ridiculous," Ritsuka shook his head. "It has to be somewhere else, like the Himalayas! Why to bother setting it up all the way down in the South Pole..."

* * *

 _Much later, during the events of Cosmos in the Lostbelt:_

"Well, Sempai," Shielder sighed as they sped away from the surrendered base through the snowy wastelands. "Looks like Sensei was right after all..."

"Not a single word of this if we ever see him again," Ritsuka said, almost as icy as their current surroundings, not really looking at her.

"Damn it, the Savage Lands were right there!" Ritsuko raged, pointing out the window. "You mean I could have been hanging out with uninhibited cavegirls in fur bikinis all this time?"

* * *

 **Don't Apologize**.

"Why don't you put your foot down?" Matoi asked her, directly appearing behind Ai.

"Ah!" Ai gasped, quickly pulling away from her classmate (even if she did spend more time in Class 3-A, to the point Ai had to deliver her notes and assignments to her every day after classes). "Sorry, I didn't notice you were there!"

"Yes, alw-" Matoi began nodding in reflex to the standard statement, before sighing at the unexpected declaration voiced instead. "Never mind. Why don't you ever say anything?" she asked, looking towards the rest of Class 3-F, all of whom were literally playing tug-of-war with Itoshiki-sensei's body as they struggled on who'd get him down the tree from which he hung today. "I mean, I'm not asking you to tell them about magic, but you _are_ his Ministra Magi. You shouldn't let them treat _your_ man like that."

"M-M-M-My man?!" Ai stuttered, terrified.

Matoi nodded sagely. "You like him, don't you? No, you _love_ him. And he's trusted you enough to make you his partner. I'd say that gives you the right to be a biiiiiiit possessive about him. Not that I'm asking you to become some obsessive compulsive sinister creep who won't ever leave him with any room to breathe, of course..." she said, moments before checking again on the GPS she'd asked Lala-san to make for her, showing her Chisame's location at all given times. Breathing room, duh.

While Matoi smiled pleasantly to herself, Ai swallowed hard. "N-No, I'm sorry, but I couldn't! I'd be imposing on him!"

"Maybe," Matoi reasoned, "he needs a proper womanly presence to make him happy. Some men are like that, they need the mother figure they never had. It's why Chisame-sama is the perfect woman for Negi-sama, other than the fact Chisame-sama is the perfect woman, period."

"I couldn't be a proper womanly presence for anyone, though," Ai meekly said, looking down as Matoi sat by her on the bench. "I can barely take care of myself!"

"Well, it's time you started to," Matoi chided her. "Look at Kitsu, she's all over him! And Kimura's flashing him her panties! Again! And Maria-chan is straddling him like a monkey! Her crotch is on the back of his neck, and she's got no panties! And Kafuka-"

"Good thing he's unconscious now, then," Ai sighed. "Sorry, I didn't mean that was a good thing since his brain must be lacking oxygen, but-!"

"That's not the point!" Matoi told her, growing frustrated. "Geez, Ai-chan, show some spine, will you! You are his partner! And that means being there for him no matter what! So why are you just sitting here feeling bad about yourself! Go and help him free from those harpies, be a woman already!"

"Ahhhh! Sorry, sorry, I've been such a pushover, and a bad partner, and- Um, will you help me with that? You're my teammate and his student too, after all..." she gulped while standing up.

"I'll be giving you all of my moral support from here," Matoi said very seriously as she relaxed back on the bench and began texting Chisame.

"But-!"

"Just go already!" Matoi commanded, roughly pushing her ahead with a none-too-subtle foot applied to Ai's butt. The ever apologetic girl stumbled forward a bit, but managed to summon her umbrella without anyone noticing as the rest of the class was too tightly gathered around the teacher, each pulling him away in a different direction.

* * *

"- and?!" Chamo eagerly asked while Matoi paused in her story at the dinner table. Negi also looked on with mild concern, while Chisame and Satomi simply kept on eating without a care. "What happened then, Nee-san?!"

Finally, she smiled. "She made me proud! She survived it! Okay, I had to step in and help a bit when Kitsu took offense and swung at her, and it took both of us to put her down after that, but Ai-chan didn't even lose any limbs! I hope she watches her back in classes from now on, though."

Negi exhaled in exasperation. "How many times do I have to tell you girls, fighting each other is totally against the spirit of the school! Seriously, Itoshiki-sensei should- Wait a moment, what happened to Itoshiki-sensei, then? Did he also survive it?"

"He survives everything and anything!" Chisame grumbled. "What kind of question is that?"

Matoi paused again, her face growing somewhat somber for a moment. "He was torn apart during the struggle."

"Gahhhh!" Negi screamed.

"Things did work out for the best at the end, however..."

* * *

Ako pondered if she shouldn't be calling Konoka right now. Really, when it came to Ala Alba business, why did they still bother coming to her, anyway? Sure, she appreciated it as it made her feel a little bit less useless than usual, but if they had such a convenient easy way out of physical trauma and pain, why not to use it at each turn? Konoka didn't seem to mind at all, if anything it was the opposite...

But then she peeked back into the room behind her small office, and saw Kaga-sempai feeding the bedridden Sensei, dutifully sitting by his bed, and Ako finally put the phone down softly.

Of course, she told herself. She should have known.

It was almost enough to make her feel sorry about failing to grasp the obvious so badly.

* * *

 **The Perfect Match**.

"Since you're a goddess," Yuuna asked her roommate, "would you happen to know who Negi-kun's perfect partner is?"

Skuld stared coldly at her.

Yuuna shrugged. "I mean, it's not that I really care myself, seriously, but I'm sure Maki-chan, Ako and Akira would like to know..."

"Well, I'm not a Goddess of Love, those are bitches," Skuld shrugged, "but if you asked me, I'd say it's someone who may or may not study in this general area, has a serious hard-on about British culture, loves tea to the point of nicknaming herself after a variety, is prim and proper, a smart and cunning strategist, merciless in the battlefield but loving and respectful out of it, perfectly polite, very attractive and very fond of saying 'The Englishmen say: "All is fair in love and war."'

"That... That is awfully specific," Yuuna said, eyebrow twitching as she already regretted ever asking.

* * *

"My perfect partner?" Darjeeling hummed thoughtfully at Rosehip's question. "Well, they'd have to be British, fond of tea and pastries, prim and proper, a smart and cunning strategist, merciless in the battlefield but loving and respectful out of it, perfectly polite, very attractive and, if possible, not that old. Maybe even a bit younger than myself, actually..." she finished with a soft smile and light blush.

"That... That is awfully specific," Rosehip said, eyebrow twitching as she already regretted ever asking.


End file.
